Hogwarts: The Marauder's Years
by Phoenix1018
Summary: Before the boy who lived, there was another famous group at Hogwarts: The Marauders. Join Remus Lupin, Sirius Black, James Potter, and Peter Pettigrew on their adventure through Hogwarts!
1. Chapter one - The Hogwarts Express

Hey! So, this is my first attempt at a multi-chapter story on this site. Considering I have severe commitment issues when it comes to stories, this may only be a few chapters. But I promise I'll try to continue it as long as I can! So anyway, this is year one of the marauders. Enjoy! More description about the story at the end of the chapter.

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Sirius stood apprehensively next to the large scarlett train, The Hogwarts Express, nervousness written all over his face. For eleven years he had wanted nothing more than to get away from his family and go to hogwarts, but now that he was finally about to do it, he was nothing but nerves. He didn't know what to do.

What if he was sorted into Slytherin? Would he turn into a perfect carbon copy Black, just like Bella and Narcissa? Would he lose all of his morales and attemt to start up muggle hunting like his crazy uncle?

Or what if he wasn't sorted into Slytherin? Would his family hate him? Would they shun him for the rest of his life? Maybe not if he was in Ravenclaw...

He was pulled from his thoughts when he felt a pair of slightly skinny arms wrap tightly around his waist. He looked down to see that his nine year old brother, Regulus, had wrapped Sirius in a hug. Regulus didn't usually hug him, so he must have been pretty sad today. "I'll miss you, Siri." he whispered into Sirius's side, hugging him tighter.

Sirius hugged Regulus back and ruffled his hair. "I know, I'll miss you too, Reg." he pulled back from the hug to smile reassuringly at his brother.

"Write to me loads!" Regulus demanded, crossing his arms at Sirius. "I'll be bored without you."

Sirius laughed slightly. "I'll write every week, I promise. I have to get on the train now. I love you, Reg."

"Love you too, Siri." Regulus said, giving Sirius one last quick hug before scampering off to stand with his mother. Sirius looked at his mother slightly, and she fixed him with her most haughty pureblood face.

"I expect to see you at Christmas, Sirius. We have an important ball then, and you need to be there, as you are my heir." She sniffed slightly. "Now, you'd best get on the train."

Sirius gave her a very cold look and, without another word to her or Regulus, sprinted onto the train to find a compartment.

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Remus couldn't believe his luck.

He was going to _Hogwarts._ He was actually going to get to go to Hogwarts and sit in the great hall and go to classes and be part of a house and he had never been more excited in his life.

Of course, he probably wouldn't be able to make friends. Because Remus had a secret, and he could never let anyone find out.

Remus was a werewolf.

He had been a werewolf since he was four years old, and it was because of the fact that he was a werewolf that made him so doubtful that he would go to hogwarts in the first place. But Dumbledore had visited their house himself and had told the Lupins that, with the right precautions, there was absolutley no reason for him not to go!

He was here now, and he wasn't going to screw it up by letting anyone find out. Even if it meant having no friends. Having no friends was better than having everyone hate you.

"Hey, mind if I sit here?" Remus's head shot up to see a boy standing leaning against his compartment doorway casually, staring at him. The boy was small and skinny, and looked to be about his age. He had messy black hair, hazel eyes, and rounded spectacles.

"Um..." Remus stammered, subcounsiously tugging the collar of his school robes up to cover the scar on his neck that had never quite healed. "Y-yeah, you can sit here, i-if you want."

The boy grinned at him and plunked into the seat across from Remus. He crossed his legs and looked at Remus expectantly. "I'm James Potter." the boy said, sticking out his hand in front of Remus.

Remus stared at the hand nervously. James actually wanted to touch him, and wasn't scared? Usually people avoided direct contact with Remus, even his own father sometimes. Only his mother ever treated him like he wasn't a monster.

Well, James didn't know he was a werewolf. Remus was sure that if he did find out, he would not he so eager to touch Remus.

Remus hesitantly grabbed James's hand and shook it. "Remus Lupin." he said quietly, looking hastily down at his lap so James couldn't stare at the scars on his face.

James's smile dissapeared for a second, and he gave Remus a somewhat searching look, before grinning again and leaning back in his seat. "So, are you - "

James was interrupted by the compartment door opening again. It was another boy, also with black hair. But this boy did not look like James in the slightest. This boy radiated "rich pureblood", from his smooth, clean cut wizards robes to his dignified and haughty posture. Only his face, which looked slightly nervous, betrayed the rest of his stature.

"Hey, mind if I sit?" Sirius asked, trying not to let his voice quiver.

One of the boys in the compartment, the black haired one, grinned at him. "Go ahead, mate!" he said cheerfully. Sirius sat down carefully next to the boy.

"I'm James Potter." he said, sticking out his hand. Sirius froze. The Blacks and the Potters had been bitter rivals since the very beginning of time, and the Potters were notorious for being in Gryffindor - the house that the Blacks despised.

But did Sirius want to be like the rest of his family anymore?

Sirius grinned back and shook James's hand enthusiastically. "I'm Sirius." he said, deciding not to include his last name in case James didn't let him sit anymore when he found out.

"Remus Lupin." The other boy said quietly, causing Sirius to turn his head. Remus was one of the most intriguing people he had ever seen. He was extremely pale and thin, and he had light, tawny locks that just barely brushed across his eyes, which were an odd amber color. But the thing that Sirius noticed as soon as he layed eyes on him were the scars. There were two long and obvious scars across his face, and Sirius could see the edge of another one peeking out from beneath his collar.

James sighed and leaned back in his seat, smiling at them. "Blimey, I can't believe we're actually going to _Hogwarts._ Are you guys excited?"

Remus did not respond, just pulled out a book from his trunk and started to read it. He did not look lile he would be talking any time soon.

Sirius grinned back at James. "Yeah. My family is absolutly insufferable, so I can't wait to be away from them for a whole year." Sirius turned to Remus, determined to get the boy to talk. "What about you, Remus? Excited to be off?"

Remus looked up, surprised that Sirius even wanted to talk to him. "Well, I'm glad that I get to go to Hogwarts, but I'm definatly going to miss home. I don't really get out much." For some reason, Remus blushed and his hand went unconsiously to his neck.

"Well I can't wait to go to Hogwarts." James said happily. "I'm definatly going to be in Gryffindor, my whole family has been. What about you two?"

Sirius looked a bit gloomy when he said, "My whole family's been in Slytherin. You know, pureblood freaks and all that."

James's eyes widened. "Slytherin? And I thought you were alright!"

Sirius shrugged. "I said my family's been in Slytherin, not that I want to be one. My family is absolutley awful, you wouldn't believe it. We literally have stuffed house elf heads on our wall."

"Blimey, that sounds awful! No wonder you hate them. You think you're gonna be in _Slytherin_ then?" James asked, saying the word as if it was a curse word.

Sirius shuddered. "Merlin, I hope not. I don't think I could stand it. As long as I'm not in Slytherin, I'm alright with any house." He turned to Remus, who had put his book away and was now listening to their conversation. "What house do you want to be, Remus?"

"I-I don't know, to be honest. I don't know too much about the different houses. I know that there are four of them, but that's about it." Remus answered honestly.

"Why? Are you muggleborn?" James asked, making Remus flush and look down at his lap. James noticed this and his eyes went wide, and he hurried to reassure Remus. "N-not that I mind, or anything! I don't mind if you're muggle born, I'm just curious, is all. Sorry."

Remus smiled a bit at James's rambling, and looked back up at him. "I'm half blood. My dad's a wizard, but he's hardly ever in the house, so I was mainly raised by my mother." Actually, his dad was never in the house because he couldn't stand to look at Remus ever since he got bit, but of course he wouldn't tell them that.

"No worries!" James said brightly, sitting up in his seat and rubbing his hands together importantly. "I'll explain the houses to you. Gryffindor is the best one, where all the awesome people go, Ravenclaw is for the nerds, Hufflepuff is for the softies, and Slytherin is for all of the gits. No offense, mate." He added, looking to Sirius.

Sirius just grinned. "None taken. If Slytherin is where all of the gits go, then my family is right at home." James laughed, and a ghost of a smile appeared on Remus's lips.

The trolley witch appeared in the doorway, wheeling her cart full of sweets with a kind smile. "Anything off the trolley, dears?"

James and Sirius both lept to their feet, but Remus blushed again and mumbled something about 'not being hungry'. Sirius looked at Remus curiously, but Remus was staring at his lap and avoiding their eyes.

Sirius just shrugged and bought as many boxes of sweets as he could carry. On a whim, he also bought several chocolate bars that Remus seemed to be eyeing from his seat.

He and James went back to their seats and Sirius dumped the chocolate ceremoniously in Remus's lap. "Tada! Here you go, mate."

Remus looked up at him, shocked. "I - you didn't have to do that!" he exclaimed, taking the chocolate off of his lap and placing it back on Sirius's. "I can't accept this! You shouldn't waste your money on me."

Sirius just put the chocolate back in Remus's lap and smiled. "Sure I can. It's my mum's money anyway, and I love to waste it. It drives her mad." When Remus still looked hesitant, he said "Mate, if you don't eat it then I'll throw it out. I don't like that kind of chocolate."

Remus stared for another moment, before smiling at Sirius. "Thank you. I love chocolate." He tore off the wrapper and took a bite of the chocolate bar.

They spent the next few hours on the train eating sweets, talking, laughing, and playing a game with the bertie botts every flavored beans. Remus seemed to be especially good at the game, his sense of taste almost seemed to be stronger than most people's.

Two other people had come to their compartment, a redheaded girl and a boy who Sirius thought looked quite greasy, but James and Sirius had quickly shooed them out. Remus felt slightly guilty about it, but these were his first ever friends, and he wasn't going to screw it up by reprimending them.

By the time they arrived at Hogwarts, the sweets had long gone, and all three boys were positivly starving. They eagerly clambered out of their compartment and out into the warm september air, only for all three of them to freeze when they caught sight of the massive man in front on them. He was at least three times the size of a normal human, and had the wildest hair they had ever seen. The man had a tiny black puppy yipping at his heels, attempting to lick his ears.

"Firs' years, firs' years over 'ere!" The man bellowed, fending off the puppy with one dustbin lid-sized hand. " _Back_ , Fang!" Sirius and James exchanged looks of wonder.

James raced up to the huge man, his grin threatening to split his face. "Hello! Who are you?" He asked, then realized that introduction might have been a bit rude.

But the man did not look remotly offended, just smiled back down at the three boys. "Hello there! Me name's Hagrid, Groundskeeper at 'ogwarts."

"Nice to meet you, sir!" Sirius said happily, looking down at the dog at Hagrid's feet. "Can I pet your dog?"

"Sure." Hagrid said, chuckling when the dog immidietly lept in Sirius' lap and started licking his face. "His name's Fang. Jus' got 'im a few weeks ago."

Sirius tickled Fang behind the ears happily. "He's brilliant. I've always loved dogs." Fang barked in response and nudged Sirius's hand with his head.

"Lads, we're gonna miss the boats." Remus reminded them quietly, still standing a few feet away from Fang. At the sound of his voice, Fang turned his head to look at Remus. After sniffing him suspiciously for a few moment, Fang backed up several steps, a growl deep in his throat. He clearly did not trust Remus.

"Wow. Not a dog person, Remus?" James said, turning to look at Remus with an amused expression on his face.

Remus gulped. He knew exactly why Fang didn't like him. Animals, espscially dogs, could usually smell that Remus was a dangerous dark creature, even when he was in his human form. His cat had ran away when he was five years old because it didn't trust Remus anymore.

"Alrigh', you three, now ya ge' on the boats, and we be on our way." Hagrid said, pointing to the lake where a fleet of small boats were. The boys said goodbye to Hagrid and climbed into one of the boats. "Alrigh', no more'n four to a boat!" Hagrid yelled at all of the first years, most of whom were looking quite terrified, both of Hagrid and the boats.

James, Sirius, and Remus were about to set off when a small and slightly chubby boy approached their boat, looking extremley nervous. "Um, y-you three mind if I sit here?" He stammered, glancing at the boat occupants.

James smiled at the boy. "Go right ahead, mate." He said kindly. When the boy still looked slightly unsure, James chuckled. "Relax, we don't bite."

Sirius noticed Remus's hand tighten a bit on the side of the boat.

"Alright..." the blonde boy said uncertianly, stumbling into the boat and looking at all three of them. "I'm P-peter Pettigrew."

"James Potter."

"I'm Sirius." Remus wondered why Sirius refrained from saying his last name.

"Remus Lupin." All of the boats set off across the glassy lake, leaving smooth rippled as they glided across.

As the boats moved more, James turned suddenly to Sirius and said "Hey, Sirius, can you swim?"

Sirius narrowed his eyes. "James, what are you about to - "

With a huge mischievious grin, James shoved Sirius into the lake with both hands. Peter gasped and Remus rolled his eyes as a huge _splash_ was hears across the grounds. Several other first years had turned their heads to ses what the commotion was, only to see Sirius's head surface out of the lake, cursing loudly.

"James Potter, you're going to _pay!!"_ Sirius bellowed. Without missing a beat, Sirius grabbed James's that was still in the boat and yanked him into the water.

"Oi!" James yelled, splashing Sirius with icy water as he surfaces. "Great, now we're _both_ gonna be all wet for the sorting ceremony."

"Yeah? And whose fault is that?" Sirius asked with a grin, splashing James with water.

James splashed him back. "Shut it. You didn't have to pull me in after you." James splashed him again.

"Oi!" Remus yelled at the two, realizing that if he didn't intervene soon, they would likely _all_ be im the lake by the time they got back to Hogwarts. "We're almost there, lads! Csn you just get back in the boat 'till we're there?"

Sirius sighed heavily. "Always the voice of reason, Remus." He joked, hauling himself back into the boat and sitting. down. He shook his head slightly, spraying Remus and Peter with water. James also climbed back into the boat, grinning.

"Alrigh', we're almost there!" Hagrid yelled at them as they rounded the corner. "Getting our first sight of Hogwarts now-"

"Blimey!" Sirius said audibly as they turned the boats, staring at the massive castle that was Hogwarts. It was the most beautiful thing he had ever seen. This was it. He was finally, _finally_ goimg to Hogwarts.

He was on his way

 **Hey! So, this is the first chapter of my Marauders story! I will try to keep this up as long as possible, but it will be difficult because I'm not good with long term stories. Anyway, this story will mainly be from the point of view from Remus and Sirius, but there will be some James and maybe some Peter.** **I feel like seeing things through Remus's POV is most interesting, because of his conflicting feelings about making friends due to his lyncanthropy, and his fear that people will find out his secret. I will make sure to include other POVs as well.**

 **Rating: T, for now. There will probably be some swearing later.**

 **Pairings: None for a while. There will be several hints at pairing, but it will probably be fourth year before a I actually start putting characters together. As for _what_ characters... there will definatly be some Jily and definatly Wolfstar. Don't like Wolfstar? Don't read, simple as that. WolfStar will probably be the main pairing in this, since the story is mainly from Remus and Sirius' POV. Sirius will probably also have several unimportant girlfriends, but I only added them for a bit of WolfStar tension, and to make Remus upset. Bwahaha I'm mean.**

 **Also another thing: I'm American. I'm trying my best to make this story sound British, but I'll probably make a few mistakes. I'm sorry.**

 **I'm trying to make this story as canon as possible, but I've changed a few things, as you can see. For one, the train introduction was a bit different. Their introduction to Lily and Snape did happen, I just didn't feel like writing it. I also felt like making Remus's father a bit meaner because I thought it would be more interesting.**

 **Thank you!!!!**


	2. Chapter two - The Sorting Hat

So... here's chapter two! I don't have much to say about it. I've decided to include marauder pranking fun in this chapter!! Haha please enjoy!

Hagrid cleared his throat and stared down at the several dozen terrified-looking first years. He grinned down at them, seemingly oblivious to their nervousness. "Alrigh', now, I'll get Professer McGonnigal..." He said importantly. He turned around and knocked on a huge set of wooden double doors.

A very stern looking witch with grey hair in a tight bun emerged, looking at all of the first years searchingly through her rimmed specticals. The first years squirmed slightly under her penetrating gaze.

"Thank you Hagrid, that will be all." She said importantly, turning to Hagrid. Hagrid nodded and walked back through the double doors, the door slamming behind him. Professer McGonnigal then turned to the rest of the first years "The start of term banquet will begin shortly", she said to them, "but before you take your seats in the Great Hall, you will be sorted into your houses. The Sorting is a very important ceremony because, while you are here, your house will be something like your family within Hogwarts. You will have classes with the rest of your house, sleep in your house dormitory and spend free time in your house common room."

"The four houses are called Gryffindor, Hufflepuff, Ravenclaw and Slytherin."

Sirius saw that Snape kid whisper something into the redhead, Evans', ear, and she smiled and nodded at him. He smiled back, and Sirius made a face. Gross.

"Each house has its own noble history and each has produced outstanding witches and wizards. While you are at Hogwarts, your triumphs will earn your house points, while any rule-breaking will lose house points. At the end of the year, the house with the most points is awarded the House Cup, a great honor. I hope each of you will be a credit to whichever house becomes yours." She looked at them extra sharply at this, as if daring any of them to break the rules while in her house. Several first years gulped.

"The Sorting Ceremony will take place in a few minutes in front of the rest of the school. I suggest you all smarten yourselves up as much as you can while you are waiting." Her eyes lingered over James and Sirius, who were still soaking wet from their little excursion in the lake. They looked innocently back at her. She just sighed and retreated back into the doorway behind them.

Peter looked at the other three boys nervously. "Um..." he asked the other boys uncertianly, "...How exactly are we getting sorted?"

Sirius clapped Peter on the shoulder. "Don't worry, we just have to try on a hat, and it decides how we're sorted." Sirius leaned in slightly and whispered mischieviously, "...But that's not what we're telling them."

"Huh?" Peter said, clearly confused. "What are you - ?"

But James, who had already caught on to what Sirius was suggesting, said loudly, "Hey, Sirius, did you hear how they're sorting people this year?"

Several first years turned around to eavesdrop when they heared James's voice, several of them also wondering how they would be sorted.

Sirius looked at James, who winked at him before assuming a solemn face once again. Sirius mimicked his expression. "Yeah, I heard." Sirius said grimly, looking at the floor. "Do you reckon we'll make it out of this one alive?" The first years exchanged terrified glances at Sirius' words.

James covered his mouth and let out a cough, which Sirius was sure was a hastily stifled snicker. After assuming his serious expression once more, he said, "I doubt it. I'm pretty sure the hat eats anyone who takes longer than 30 seconds to get sorted."

Sirius covered his mouth in mock horror as the first years started whispering among themselves again. "Yeah, I heard that, too. One minute, you're perfectly fine. Next minute: hat food."

"Sirius!" Remus said angrily, and Sirius and James sighed, already knowing that Remus was about to lecture them for scaring all of the first years.

But they were shocked when instead Remus said, "Don't joke about that, Sirius. You know what happened to my cousin last year." Remus gave Sirius a wink before burying in face in his hands in mock-anguish. A complete hush had fallen across the room, everyone craning their ears to hear the conversation. "Hat food." Remus whispered behind his hands, just loud enough for everyone to hear. They all gasped.

Truth be told, Remus didn't really know why he was participating in this completly asinine prank instead of reprimending them for it, but something about being a part of something, even if it was a juvenile (and somewhat cruel) prank, warmed his heart. So he decided to play along, for now.

James and Sirius both looked like they would explode with laughter if they said another word, so Peter quickly decided to jump in and say "Oh, mate, I'm so sorry. I forgot about your cousin." Peter put a hand on Remus' shoulder. "Rest in peace, Daphne Lupin. We'll miss you." he said gravely, making up a name on the spot.

Professer McGonnigal suddenly opened the door and all of the heads turned to her, which was good because Sirius and James didn't look like they would be able to go much longer without exploding with laughter. "Come now, the sorting is about to begin." McGonnigal said, beckoning the first years inside. They all went inside the room, and there were several audible gasps.

Even though most of them were still terrified at the prospect of being eaten alive by a sentient hat, they could not help but be transfixed by the beauty that was the great hall. Remus thought that the room could probably fit ten of his entire house. There w ere four huge tables across the hall where most of the students were already sitting, and there was another table at the head of the room. Thousands of glittering candles were in the air below the enchanted ceiling, and Remus vaugley wondered what spell had been used to make the ceiling mimick the weather, and contemplated using it in his own room when he got home.

He was jarred out of his thoughts when he saw McGonnigal carrying a 3 legged stool and a very frayed hat, which Remus assumed was the hat that would be sorting them. She placed the stool in the middle of the room, and the great hall hushed in anticipation. It was so quiet you could hear a pin drop when a tear in the brim of the hat opened like a mouth and -

It began to sing.

Every year September first

I'm called to do my duty

To attend the Hogwarts welcome banquet

And show you all my inner beauty.

I know you think I'm old and worn

And should be thrown away

But I hold the key to your future

Starting from today

I have no easy task before me

For alone I must decide,

By looking into your inner thoughts

I choose what house that you'll reside

There's Hufflepuff and Ravenclaw

There's Slytherin and Gryffindor

Four great wizards who once chose themselves

But can no longer, for they are no more

What Hufflepuff valued the most

Was hard work, Loyalty, and determination

And Rowena Ravenclaw believed

Great knowlage was their insperation

Three words that describe Slytherin

Are ambitios, sly, and cunning

And last there was Godric Gryffindor

Courageous, noble, and brave

So put me there right on your head

And lets get the sorting on,

for I know all that there is to know

and I am never wrong!

The great hall burst into wild applause, save for most of the first years who still were convinced that they were about to be eaten by a talking hat.

When the applause slowly died down, McGonnigal walked up to the stool unfurling a long scroll, presumably with all of their names on it. She cleared her throat loudly and read the first name on the list. "Abbot, Aron!"

A small boy with sandy blonde hair stumbled to the stool, trembling from head to toe. The boy sat in the chair and slowly lowered the hat onto his head, scrunching up his face in anticipation. The hat was silent for 5 seconds, 10, 15, 20...

When the hat reached the 30 second mark, Aron gave a loud squeal and buried his face in his hands, clearly expecting the sorting hat to grow fangs and devour him to bits.

When the hat just continued to remain silent, Aron opened his eyes and glanced up at the hat, clearly confused.

"HUFFLEPUFF!" The hat cried after 37 seconds of being on Aron' head.

There was polite applause from each of the tables and McGonnigal motioned to take the hat from Aron, but he did not remove the hat from his head or move from the chair. "The hat's not about to eat me?" he asked, the shock clear in his voice.

Laughter rippled through the great hall, and James and Sirius struggled not to join in, knowing that they would look suspicious if they did. McGonnigal frowned down at Aron. "The sorting hat does not ever eat people. Who ever put that ridiculous notion in your head?" She asked him incredulously.

Aron just gave a terrified glance to James and Sirius before getting up from the stool and collapsing at the Hufflepuff table, clearly very relieved. McGonnigal gave a loud sigh before turning to the rest of the first years. "I don't know how any of you got the idea that the sorting hat has ever eatenpeople, but I will hasten to assure you that the sorting hat has never eaten a student before, and I would be quite shocked if it happened today." She turned back to the list in her hand and said, "Black, Sirius."

James glanced sharply at Sirius and froze. Black, did she say? His parents had spent his whole life telling him how the Blacks were a family full of dark magic, and that they couldn't be trusted. But Sirius didn't seem to be like that at all...

Sirius, meanwhile, had gone extremly pale and was now walking stiffly up to the stool, and James could hear him whispering "not Slytherin, not Slytherin, please not Slytherin" furioisly under his breath.

Sirius sat carefully in the stool and places the had on his head, which fell over his eyes, and all he could see was a curtian of black across his eyes.

'Another Black, eh?' A small voice said in his head, which Sirius presumed was the sorting hat. 'Well, I know just what to do with - "

If you put me in Slytherin I'll tear you in half, Sirius thought firmly, interrupting befor he could immidietly be sorted into Slytherin.

He heard a small chuckle from in his head. 'Of course not, mister Black.' the hat said, and even thought it wasn't technically speaking, Sirius could hear the amusment in its voice. 'Yes, now that I'm looking closer, I see that you don't possess the traits for a Slytherin at all... no, sir...' Sirius beamed, not that anyone could see him.

The hat continued, 'so, definatly not Slytherin, no... but where to go? You've got plenty of brains, yes, but you also have a fair heart, and plenty of courage... yes, difficult, very difficult... where to put you...?

The rest of the great hall, meanwhile, was whispering curiously. Why was a Black taking so long to be sorted? Shouldn't the hat decide it should be in Slytherin the moment it touches his head? What was taking so long?

Meanwhile, the hat continued, 'any house, really, could lead you to success... which one, though...?

'Gryffindor?' Sirius thought hopefully.

'Gryffindor, eh?' the hat said curiously, 'truly the Black sheep of the Black family...' Sirius rolled his eyes inside the hat, 'But I believe that you need true friends in order to succeed, and I don't think you'll find them anywhere but -

"GRYFFINDOR!" the hat shouted the last word to the entire hall.

Silence.

The entire hall was in shock, and even the teachers didn't know what to say. Gryffindor?? A Black, in Gryffidor? There had to be a mistake...

With a grin so huge it could split his face, Sirius wrenched the hat off of his head, threw a fist in the air, and cried, "Hah, Gryffindor! Take that, mum!"

There was a ripple of uneasy laughter through the great hall, and James started clapping loudly, the others joining in quickly. Ignoring the murderous glares from the Slytherin table, Sirius bound from the stool and collapsed at the Gryffindor table, grinning like a madman. James shot him a thumbs up from his place in the crown, and Remus gave him a small smile. Peter was too busy fretting about what house he would be in.

"Evan, Lily!"

Evans smiled reassuringly at Snape before going up to the sorting hat and placing it on her head. She waited for a few seconds before the hat cried "GRYFFINDOR!!"

Remus heard a tiny groan from Snape as Lily gave him an apologetic smile and went to sit at the Gryffindor table. James groaned. "I can't believe that nosy busybody is in Gryffindor!" He whispered into Remus's ear.

Remus frowned. "She's not that bad." he said, glancing over at Lily. He felt a bit bad for her. She wasn't going to know anybody from her house. And she was a muggle born, so she probably was very unfarmiliar with the wizarding world. If he was in Gryffindor, he decided, he would talk to her after the feast. He knew what it felt like to have no friends.

"Lupin, Remus!"

Remus went extremly pale. Here we go...

Trying to keep his legs from shaking, Remus walked up to the hat and put it slowly on his head.

'A werewolf, eh?' the voice said in his head, 'I've never sorted one of you before...'

Please don't tell! Remus begged.

The hat chuckled. 'No worries, my child, I am only a hat, he said. 'Now let's see, where to put the werewolf... well, definatly not Slytherin, you don't have nearly enough ambition...'

Should I be offended? Remus thought wryly.

The hat chuckled again. 'You are amusing, my boy... well, you are quite smart, yes, but for someone like you to come to Hogwarts, even defying your father, who never believed in you... that takes intense bravery... so it better be - '

"GRYFFINDOR!!"

A delighted smile spread across Remus' face as he took the hat off of his head and stood up. He saw James and Peter both grinning at him in the crowd as he went to sit next to Sirius. Sirius clapped him on the back and whispered "good job, Remus." into his ear. Lily Evans smiled at his from across the table.

He had a family now.

"Pettigrew, Peter!"

Remus and Sirius both flashed Peter encouraging smiles from the Gryffindor table, and James slapped him good naturedly on the back as Peter walked up to the hat. Peter sat on the bench and jammed the hat on his head. He sat for thirty seconds, then a minute, then two -

When it reached the three minute mark, students started to whisper again. What was taking so long?

Finally, after 3 minutes and 17 seconds, the hat cried, "GRYFFINDOR!"

Sirius clapped loudly along with the rest of the Gryffindors as Peter sat down at the Gryffindor table. "Brilliant, mate! Sirius said loudly, slapping Peter on the back. Peter looked very relieved.

"Potter, James!"

James walked up to the sorting hat confidently. The hat had barely laid atop his untidy hair when it cried, "GRYFFINDOR!" James proudly walked over to the Gryffindor table and say next to Sirius. Lily Evan, who was sitting across from Remus, made a face and scooted closer to Marlene McKennon.

"Snape, Severus!"

James and Sirius pretended to gag as Snape walked up to the sorting hat. "The poor hat, it's gonna be all greasy!" James whispered into Sirius's ear, making him snicker.

"SLYTHERIN!"

Remus saw Lily flash Snape an apologetic smile as he went to go sit at the Slytherin table.

After the rest of the students were sorted, Albus Dumbledore (Sirius knew who he was because of his mother's constant rants about him) stood from his seat, and the hall fell silent immidietly. Dumbledore spread his arms wide, as if there was nothing he'd rather do more then to stand there all day with them. "Good evening, students! To those of you who are new, welcome! To those who aren't, welcome back!" He beamed down at all of them. "There is a time for a speech, but this is not it. Tuck in!"

Remus looked down at the plates and his jaw dropped to the floor. All of the silver serving plated had been filled with every type of food imaginable. Forgetting that the serving plates were silver (note from author: in this fanfic, Werewolves can't touch silver. I know it's not confirmed canon, but I'm choosing it to be) Remus reached out eagerly to grab a chicken wing.

"Ouch!" Sirius turned to see Remus drawing his arm back from the plate hastily, clutching his hand. Sirius furrowed his eyebrows.

"What's wrong, Remus?" Sirius asked, grabbing Remus' hand. Remus tried to wrench it away, but Sirius turned his wrist around and saw a red, blistering burn on his wrist. "That's quite a bad burn, Remus. Don't touch the plates, lads, they're hot."

Peter and James nodded and thankfully avoided the plates for the rest of the meal, which was good because Remus didn't feel like explaining how a barely warm plate had caused his skin to blister.

When the last morsles of the delicious meal had dissapeared, Dumbledore stood again, causing the hall to quickly fall silent. He beamed down at them again before assuming a serious expression. "I have a few reminders for you before you tramp off to your dorms for the night. First, Mr. Filch has asked me to remind you that fanged frisbees have been banned this year, along with a list of other items that can be viewed inside Mister Filch's office."

"Secondly, the forbidden forest is exactly its name: forbidden. I would highly advise that you stay out of it, if you don't wish to encounter some creatures that I'm sure are not so friendly."

Dumbledore's gaze flicked to Remus ever so slightly before saying, "One last thing. Over the holiday, Professer Sprout has aquired a whomping willow seed" There were several murmures among the students, and Remus had gone oddly silent and was staring determinedly at the table. "It is now planted on the edge of the forbidden forest, and I would advise you not go near it, either. It has a tendency to, well, whomp. Now, that will be all. Off to bed with you!"

A dull murmuring slowly swelled through the great hall as the children rose from their tables and followed their prefects to the dormetories. The four boys joined the crowd of Gryffindors that were heading to the Gryffindor common rooms. The prefect led them to the Gryffindor portrait hole and told them the password (Hippogryphs), leading them in the cozy looking common room. The prefect motioned the four boys up a spiral staircase, and they had barely closed the door to their dorm before James and Sirius both collapsed onto the four poster beds and burst into laughter.

"Bloody... brilliant... prank!" Sirius choked out, clutching his stomache in mirth. "Did you see their faces? They actually thought they were going to be eaten!"

"That fake dead cousin was really the kicker, though." James chuckled, clapping Remus on the shoulder. "Nice touch, mate. Well done."

Remus just groaned and buried his face in his hands. "I can't believe we did that!" Remus said in a mortified whisper. "One day into school and we've already gotten into trouble!"

"But we didn't get into trouble." Peter argued, a huge grin on his face. "We just did bad things, we didn't get caught for it! Besides, even you have to admit it was pretty brilliant."

Remus smiled a bit in spite of himself. "Alright, it was pretty funny." he said with a reluctant grin. "But I'm not doing it again!"

"Sure you won't, Remus." Sirius said, clearly unconvinced. He looked around at the other three boys in the room and smiled. "Look at that. Who'd've believed that all four of us would be in the same house?"

"I'm not surprised." James declared, his hands on his hips. "We're all too awesome to be in any other house. I can tell we're gonna be best friends for the rest of our lives."

Remus smiled. Best friends. He liked the sound of that. With a stifled yawn, Remus sat on the four poster bed closest to the window. "I'm gonna call it for the night. Don't want to be late for lessons tomorrow."

The other three boys murmured their agreement and laid down in their respective beds. Sirius sighed and stretched out in his four poster, admiring the red colors that were so different to the bottle green that adorned the rooms in his own house. He grinned. I'm finally home, he thought happily.

Sirius turned to the side of his bed and said, "Goodnight, mates."

"Goodnight, Sirius."

"Goodnight."

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Okaaaaaay, here's chapter two! Like I said, this is mostly Remus and Sirius POV, so I didn't include James' or Peter's sorting in this. I need ideas for pranks! If you have any ideas, please let me know! And like I said in a previous fanfic, I'm not making Peter just a tagalong fanboy, because I don't think the other three marauders had enough compassion to include Peter in their group if they didn't genuinly like him.

I also like the idea of a Lily and Remus friendship, because even though she hates James and Sirius at the moment, she would still probably have study sessions with Remus in the library when Remus wanted a break from them.

Anyway, please review! Give me any ideas that you can, I'm open to all suggestions! See you soon!


	3. Chapter three - The First Lesson

**So... chapter three! Thank you for all of the wonderful reviews, I really appriciate it. And a thank you t** **o** **vampiregir** **l0421** **for the prank ideas!** **I'll definatly take them into consideration.** **And thank you to the suggestion from Jezgirl,I will almost definatly do that at some point.** **Please enjoy this chapter!**

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Remus jolted suddenly awake, breathing heavily and staring wildly around, willing his fuzzy brain to comprehend his surroundings. Where was he?

He was staring up at a scarlet canopy, buried underneath several warm blankets...oh. Right. Remus turned on his side and saw Sirius Black in the bed next to him, his arm flopped over his stomache and snoring loudly.

Remus grinned. He was at Hogwarts.

Remus slowly sat up, ignoring his creaking muscles, and glanced around the room. The sun was just barely peeking over the horizen, bathing the room in a pale orange glow, and thankfully all of his roomates were still asleep. He let out a sigh of relief.

Careful not to wake them, Remus tiptoed across the room to the showers, grabbing his rather worn and secondhand school robes as he did.

He stepped into the bathroom and quickly undressed, pointedly avoiding the mirror as to not look at the various jagged scars that littered his torso, as well as the massive gaping tear on his left shoulder, where the origional bite had been. The bite stretched all across his upper chest and curled around his left shoulder. He had nearly died when he was first bitten at age 4, but with a combanation of his mother's quick handiwork and weeks of intensive care at St. Mungo's, he had somehow. pulled through.

But he still had the scar, as well as many, many others from the full moons, where the normally polite and reserved Remus turned into a murderous, ravening beast and spent the whole night locked in his cellar, shredding himselves to bits.

That was one of the things he had been worried about when he first came to Hogwarts. His roomates seeing his scars. That's why he had trained himself to wake up so early, so he could shower and get dressed before his roomates were even up.

Remus turned the knob on the shower and made it as hot as it would go. The water stung his skin and made his flesh turn slightly pink, but it felt good. He just stood there for a moment, letting the hot water wash over his abused skin. It was refreshing.

His oversensitive hearing quickly picked up the sound of movement from outside the door, meaning that someone else was awake. Remus hurriedly stepped out of the shower and pulled his white school shirt over his still-sopping hair, not bothering to dry it, followed by his trousers, socks, shoes, vest, and tie. He finally pulled his robe over his shoulders when he heard an almighty _crash!_ followed by loud swearing and another loud _Thunk!_ Remus sighed heavily and stepped out of the bathroom, bracing himself for whatever idiocy he was about to walk into.

He was not dissapointed. Sirius was sitting up in his bed, clutching his wand and rubbing his slightly red ear in distaste, James was crumpled up in a heap in the corner of the room, covered in large reddish boils and swearing loudly, and Peter was watching the whole scene and positivly roaring with laughter.

Remus sighed and put his hand to his temple. He looked around the room. "What happened?" Remus said wearily.

James looked at him, an indignant expression on his face. "Sirius hexed me!"

"Well, James threw a pillow at me!" Sirius said in an equally annoyed tone.

Remus turned exasperatedly to Peter, who was trying (and failing) to contain his laughter. "Peter?" he asked tiredly. "What happened?"

Peter, with a huge grin on his face, said, "Sirius wouldn't wake up, so James threw a pillow at his face. Then Sirius hexed him."

"Remus!!" James said monotonously, lying dramatically on the floor and putting a hand to his head. "Remus, I'm hideous! Sirius has ruined me, Remus! Please, Remus - "

"James, please shut up." Remus said, unable to keep from smirking slightly. "You're giving me a headache. Just sit still and be quiet so I can find the counter charm."

Remus walked over to his trunk and pulled out a book his mother had bought him about healing spells. Ever since he had gotten his wand in Diagon alley, he had been practicing all of the spells he could, determined not to let his upringing make him behind all of his classmates.

Remus found the counterspell to the boils hex and walked over to James. He really did look awful with all those boils all over his face. Remus sighed and reluctantly muttered the counter spell, James' face was restored to its origional condition.

James sighed in relief. "Thanks, mate." He said joyfully, slapping Remus on the back. "I'm gonna hit the showers. You two coming?"

"Yeah." Sirius said, seemingly having forgotten his previous anger at James. He and Peter tramped off with James to the showers.

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Once the other three boys were showered and dressed, they all tramped to the great hall. Sirius and Peter (who were definatly not the morning people of the group) were still grumbling a bit, but over all they were pretty excited for their first day at Hogwarts.

"Ahh, breakfast!" James exclaimed as they entered the great hall, him and Sirius making a beeline for the food.

Remus made a face. Were all boys this... insane? He truly wouldn't know, considering he didn't have much opportunity to talk to other boys as a child.

Remus was about to join the other three boys when something - or rather, someone - caught his eye. Lily Evans, the girl that had been talking to Snape, was sitting alone at the Gryffindor table, picking at her food moodily. "Um, lads, I'll be right back." Remus said to no one in particular before hesitantly approaching Lily. "Um, Lily? Can I sit here?" he asked somewhat shyly.

Lily looked up at him and gave him a small smile. "Sure." Remus sat next to Lily and smiled back at her. "You're Remus, right?" She asked.

"Yeah." Remus said, giving a small shrug of his shoulder. "I saw you on the train. I, uh, overheard that you were a muggleborn and figured you might be a little lonely, you know." he smiled uncertianly, hoping she wouldn't be offended.

Apparently, she wasn't. She just smiled back at him and said, "That's sweet of you. You're right, I don't really know anyone here. The only friend I had when I came here was sorted into Slytherin." Lily shot a longing glance at the Slytherin table, where Snape was sitting and talking with Lucius Malfoy. "Everyone's saying that Slytherin is where all the bad people go, but I don't think that Severus..." she trailed off uncertianly, biting her lip.

Remus gave her a reassuring smile. "Don't worry. Not all Slytherins are evil. The Gryffindors can just be a bit biased sometimes, but I'm sure they're alright."

She smiled. "Thanks, Remus. You're very sweet. It is rather lonely, being in a world where everything is new, and everyone already seems to know everything about it but you. The girls in my dorm are nice enough, but they're all just so _loud_." She scrunched up her face in distaste. "I'd much rather just read a book."

Remus laughed a little bit. "I know that feeling."

"Oi, Remus!" Remus whipped around to see Sirius calling his name, waving him frantically over. "Come over here! You're the only person who adds any sanity to our group!"

"Oi!" James said indignantly.

Remus rolled his eyes fondly at Sirius before turning back to Lily. "I've got to go, but I'll talk to you later?" he said hopefully.

Lily smiled at him. "Sure. It was nice talking to you, Remus. I hope we can be friends from now on."

Remus nodded at her. "See you later, Lily." He said before getting up and joining his friends at the other side of the table.

Sirius made a face at him. "Why were you talking to Evans?" he asked in distaste, glancing over at the redhead who was now talking to Alice Richards.

Remus frowned at him. "She looked lonely, so I went to go talk to her. She's very nice, Sirius. You should lay off of her a bit."

Sirius clapped Remus on the shoulder. "Hey, _I_ haven't done anything to Evans. It's James who started insulting her boyfriend for no reason."

Remus sighed and rolled his eyes, but did not argue any further, knowing it would probably be futile. Instead he just took a piece of toast from the toast rack (taking care not to touch the silver parts) and took a bite.

Suddenly, hundreds of owls zoomed into the great hall at once, making Remus let out a rather undignified yelp and jump in his seat. Sirius smiled at him and ruffled his hair. "Ah, poor Remus, never used owl post. Probably had to send all of his letters using that mental box-thing that muggles do."

Remus smiled ruefully. The truth was, he had never used owl post because he never had anyone to write to because of his lyncanthropy. His father had an owl, but it was usually at work with him, so he never saw it.

A large, handsome owl landed infront of Sirius, which let out a loud screech before dropping a bright red envelope infront of Sirius and flying away.

Sirius smiled bitterly and picked up the letter. "Ah, looks like my dear old mum has sent me a howler."

Remus eyed the red letter apprehensivly, which had started to smoke around the edges. "What's a - "

But his question was immidietly answered for him when the letter exploded right there at the Gryffindor table. Several people screamed, and James and Peter stuffed their fingers in their ears. The flaming letter started to yell at Sirius:

"SIRIUS ORION BLACK!! BELLATRIX WROTE ME AND TOLD THAT YOU'VE BEEN SORTED INTO GRYFFINDOR! NO ONE HAS EVER BROUGHT MORE SHAME ON THE BLACK FAMILY! FILTHY BLOOD TRAITOR! SCUM!"

It was horrible. The howler continued to yell insults at Sirius, and at Gryffindor. Several of the people near it had turned to look at Sirius with horrified expressions on their faces, but Sirius didn't seem surprised at all. He just had a mildly disgusted look on his face, like someone who had just stepped in something a dog had left in the sidewalk.

Meanwhile, the letter continued to hurl insults at him:

"THIS IS ABSOLUTLY UNNACCEPTABLE, SIRIUS BLACK! KEEP CARRYING ON LIKE THIS, AND YOU'LL BE DISOWNED! AND DON'T EVEN THINK ABOUT COMING HOME FOR CHRISTMAS, I DON'T WANT TO SEE YOUR FACE! YOU DISGUST ME!"

And with that last note, the letter tore itsself into pieces and burst into flames. The entire great hall was now gawping at Sirius, but he just brushed the shredded bits of paper off of his bacon and said nonchalontly, "My, that was loud, wasn't it?"

There was a bit of uneasy laughter, and people slowly started talking again until the normal chatter was restored. James stared at Sirius incredulously. "Blimey, mate, I know you said she was awful, but I didn't think she was _that_ awful!"

There was something rather forced about Sirius's grin when he said, "Yeah, insanity is a Black family trait, in case you hadn't noticed." Sirius looked down at his empty plate and sighed. "Shall we head to lessons? I think we have transfiguration first."

The other three boys muttered affirment, and they all got up and walked out of the great hall.

Remus noticed that Sirius was lagging slightly behind the other boys, and he had a somewhat distant expression on his face.

After thinking for a moment, Remus slowly stepped over to Sirius. "A-are you sure you're okay, Sirius?" He asked quietly, trying to catch his stormy grey eyes "I know you said you didn't care about your mum, but I just wanted to be sure..." Remus bit his lip nervously, hoping he wasn't overstepping.

Sirius looked at Remus's earnestly worried expression and couldn't help but smile a little bit. "I'm not upset about my mother." He said honestly. "I'm worried about how my brother will react."

Sirius knew that Remus was waiting for him to elaborate, but he couldn't bring himself to be more specific. He was sure if he started talking about Regulus he would end up crying, and that would definatly be a damper on everyone's good moods.

Sirius was thankful that Remus didn't inquire him any further. Remus just put a (somewhat nervous) hand on Sirius' shoulder and gave him a small smile before walking ahead again to join the other boys.

"Um... does anyone have any idea where we're actually going?" James said after a moment of comfortable silence.

All four boys stopped simultaniously and slowly glanced around at the hallway they were in. Sirius realized that they indeed had no clue where they were going.

"Dammit." He muttered, glancing around again. "I think we're lost. How are we going to get to class now?"

"Dunno." Peter said, wringing his hands nervously. "We could ask a prefect?"

Remus rolled his eyes at them. " _or_ ," He said pointedly, "We could follow the large crowd of other Gryffindor first years currently leaving the great hall that are probably headed _exactly_ where we need to go."

The other three boys glanced behind them to that of course Remus was right. James smiled sheepishly. "Right, Remus." He said, hastily patting Remus on the shoulder before they all joined the sea of first years heading to their lessons.

They arrived in the transfiguration classroom not long after that, but McGonnagal was not yet in the classroom. Sirius and James glanced at eachother and both sat in the very front row of the classroom simultaniously.

Remus raised an amused eyebrow. "I didn't take you two for 'front of the classroom' type people." Remus joked lightly, taking the other seat next to Sirius as Peter took the one next to James.

James made a face. "I'm not. I'm just good at transfiguration, and I figure it's smart to get on McGoogle's good side early on."

Remus laughed. "If you want to get on her good side, you probably shouldn't call her 'McGoogles.'" James just shrugged and grinned.

Sirius grinned. "I'm just sitting in the front because James is."

Remus just smiled and shook his head slightly as the classroom door opened and McGonnagal entered the classroom

"Settle down, now." McGonnagal said sharply, causing the class to fall silent immidietly.

McGonnagal started the class by giving them all a very stern lecture about the art of transfiguration which Sirius honestly didn't absorb a word of, and after taking a lot of notes about technique and wand movement, they were set to work attemting to transfigure a match into a needle.

"Alright, I got this, lads." James said importantly, rolling up his sleeves and pointing his wand at his match. " _Avifors!_ " He said clearly, waving his wand. His match got a little bit sharper on the edges, but otherwise no change was made.

Sirius snickered. "Not all you're cracked up to be, are you Potter?"

James shoved Sirius lightly. "Sod it, Sirius." He said with a smile. "I'd like to see if you can do it any better."

Sirius scoffed and waved his wand at his match. It glowed slightly, then went back to its origional condition. "Damn!"

Remus sighed. "You're doing it wrong, lads." Remus said with a slight smile, pointing his wand at his match. "Watch me - _Avifors!_ " Remus's match glowed like Sirius', then turned entirely silver.

Peter gawked at him. "How did you do that?!" Peter demanded.

"I don't know, probably cause I listened to the teacher like I was supposed to." Remus said, not bothering to hide the sarcasm in his voice.

"I was listening!" James said indignantly. "I'm just really confused! I did better than Sirius, anyway." Sirius mock-glared at him.

After a bit more playful bickering between James and Sirius, the four boys went back to their matches.

At the end of the class, the only people who had succesfully transfigured their matches into needles: Remus, James, and Lily Evans. McGonnagal gave the three a rare smile as she displayed their perfect needles to the classroom

"Alright, you all are dismissed." McGonnagal said, sitting herself behind her desk and waving her wand, restoring the needles back into matches for her next class.

Remus made to follow Sirius and the rest out, but he stopped when he heard McGonnagal call out to him "Wait, Mister Lupin, I would like a word with you."

Sirius glanced worriedly between Remus and McGonnagal, his brows furrowed. "What did you do, Remus?" He whispered into Remus' ear.

"Nothing!" Remus whispered back somewhat defensivly before hesitantly approaching McGonnagal's desk. Sirius, James, and Peter remained uncertianly in the doorway, not wanting to leave Remus alone.

McGonnagal sighed at the three boys. "Black, Potter, Pettigrew. This conversation does not concern you. Run along, now."

With one last concerned glance at Remus, the other three boys slowly exited the classroom.

McGonnagal turned back to Remus and peered at him through her specticals. "Now, Mister Lupin. As your head of house, I would like to discuss the arrangments we have made for your Lyncanthropy."

Remus winced slightly. Remus was not used to people talking so straightfowardly about his condition, save for perhaps his mother. Would professer McGonnagal be prejudiced? "Y-yes, professer?" He asked quietly.

McGonnagal gave Remus a small smile. "You need not worry, Mister Lupin. We are simply here to discuss where you are going to go on full moon days." When Remus gave her a small nod, she continued, "So, as you are no doubt aware, the full moon is next week."

How could I forget? "Yes, I'm aware."

"And are you aware of where you are to go on those full moon days?"

"U-um, I am to report to madam Pomphrey, and she will take me to the whomping willow?" Remus said cautiously.

"Yes." McGonnagal said, sighing and shuffling a few papers on her desk before continuing. "Madam Pomphrey will take you through a passage way in the willow, which leads to the shrieking shack. And don't worry, the shack is reinforced, so there's no way you could escape."

McGonnagal cleared her throat. "Now, professer Dumbledore and I talked last night, and we agreed that, should you feel you are unable to attend class, you should be allowed to stay out of class a day or two before the moon. I trust you not to abuse this privelage."

Remus bit his bottom lip between his teeth, thinking for a moment. He could not skip class. If he didn't keep his grades up, Dumbledore might not let him stay at Hogwarts..."Thank you, Professer, but I am sure that won't be neccisary." He said politely.

Professer McGonnagal raised her eyebrows. "Well, should you ever deem it neccisary, just know that you have that privelage." She cleared her throat. "Now, do you have any questions?"

Remus looked down and thought for a moment. "Um... who else know that I-I'm a w-werewolf?" He truly hated how he stuttered in situations like this. It made him feel so stupid. Some Gryffindor you are, he thought somewhat bitterly.

Professer McGonnagal said, "Well, obviously I have been informed, as I am your head of house. The other people that know are Professer Dumbledore, Madam Pomphrey, and Hagrid."

"Hagrid?" Remus repeated, confusion clear in his voice.

"Hagrid knows a great deal about magical creatures, so we decided to inform him as well. You need not worry, Hagrid is a very nice man."

Remus had one more question. "...What do I tell my friends?"

McGonnagal thought for a moment. "Well," she said slowly, "I would not reccomend that you tell them the real reason for your absences - "

"No, of course not! I know, professer, i won't" Remus interrupted hastily. He did not want to lose the only friends he had ever made in his life. Not only would they hate him, but they would tell everyone about his condition and he would be expelled. He mentally shivered. He would never let that happen.

McGonnagal smiled slightly. "I know, Mister Lupin, you are a smart boy. My suggestion is that you concoct a sick relative that you have to visit every month. Perhaps your mother, because she is a Muggle and I very much doubt your three pureblood friends know anything about Muggle sicknesess."

Remus nodded. Seemed like a good enough plan. His friends weren't likely to get suspicious of that, were they? "Sounds good, professer." He said.

McGonnagal nodded. "Good." She said. "Now, Black, Potter, and Pettigrew are likely hovering outside of my door right now, waiting for you, so I suggest you go reassure them that you are not expelled. Run along now."

Remus grinned. "Thank you, professer." He said quickly, walking away and opening the door to the classroom to see that his friends were indeed waiting for him outside of the door.

Sirius noticed him first. "Remus!" he exclaimed, rushing up to Remus. "What happened? Are you in trouble? Do you have detention? What did you do? I bet you pulled a prank without us, you git, how could you - ?"

"Sirius!" Remus exclaimed with a laugh, holding up his hand to silence Sirius. "Please, slow down! I'm not in trouble."

Sirius grinned. "Good. I would have been furious if you had pulled a prank without us."

James and Peter bobbed next to Sirius, also grinning. "So, if you aren't in trouble, what happened?" Peter asked curiously, glancing at the door to McGonnagals classroom.

"Um..." Remus stuttered, his brain quickly fumbling with the excuse that he and McGonnagal had created, "W-we were just t-talking about my mum."

"You're mum?" James repeated, confused. "Why?"

"Sh-she's ill." Remus said quietly, trying his best to make it sound convincing. "It's a muggle illness. So McGonnagal gave me permission to visit her every month."

The three boy's grins quickly fell. "Oh, I'm sorry, Remus. That's dreadful." James said, looking so genuinly sorry for Remus that it made him feel awful for lying.

Imstead Remus smiled a bit. "Oh, it's okay." Remus said. "She's not going to die or anything. I just like to see her sometimes to make sure she's okay."

Sirius walked up and put a hand on Remus's shoulder comfortingly. "You'll let us know if you need anything, right?"

The concern in Sirius' eyes made Remus' stomache boil with guilt. He hated that he had to lie, but what other choice did he have? "Of course I will, Sirius. You don't need to worry about me." Remus said with a smile that didn't meet his eyes.

Sirius smiled back and shook Remus' shoulder slightly before withdrawing his hand and facing the other two boys. "Now," Sirius announced, "Does anyone know where we're going next?"

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 **This is an important message!!**

 **So, because I have the fanfiction app on my phone, when someone reviews my story I can't tell which chapter the review is on. So please, please, when you review, also include which chapter you're reviewing! Thank you!**

 **Alright, the important message is over. So, here's chapter three! Hope you enjoyed it. I don't have much to say about it, tbh.**

 **If anyone has any ideas for this story (Seriously, _any_ ideas, I'll take it all into consideration) please let me know! And as always, please review and expect an update sometime next week! Bye bye!.**


	4. Chapter four - Of Pranks and Prejudices

**Here's chapter four! This chapter probably won't be super important to the plot, maybe just some marauders bonding and pranking fun.**

 **For me, writing the marauders is difficult, because I have to make them sort of playfully mean to eachother, because I feel like that's how their friendship works, and I have to make them kind of act like assholes to the Slytherins and Lily, but at the same time, I absolutly love the marauders, and I have to make them be nice to eachother, and have some sort of compassion. It's kind of hard for me to find the hapy medium for that.** **A lot of fanfictions that I see online depict the marauders way meaner than I think they should be.**

 **Despite the fact that I pretty much have absolutley no clue what I'm doing, I really love writing this fanfiction, and I hope you guys enjoy reading!**

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The rest of the first week for the marauders was largely uneventful. They had charms with Flitwick, which once again, Lily and Remus excelled at. They had their first Defence Against the Dark arts class with Professer Anders, who spent the entire lesson demonstrating brilliant (albiet mostly useless) defence spells, and only once the class was almost over did he make them hurriedly scrawl a few sentences about the jelly-legs jinx before they all left the classroom.

On their third day, they had potions with Professer Slughorn, a class that Remus could easily say he did _not_ like at all. All of the smells combining and simmering in the dungeons was a barrage on Remus' sensitive nose, and it made him nauseous as soon as he stepped inside of the classroom. He tried to hide it from the others, but he could tell that they noticed. And to top it all, Remus wasn't very good at potions at all ("Don't worry, mate. If you were good at _all_ of your classes I'd probably be pretty pissed." Sirius reassured him when he had somehow exploded his cauldron attempting to make a cure for boils.). So, definatly not his favorite class.

But, all in all, a fairly uneventful first week back.

When the classes were over on Friday, Sirius collapsed dramatically at the Gryffindor table in the great hall. " _Finally,_ classes are over for the week! I'm starving!" Sirius immidietly loaded his plate with pork chops and took a large bite.

Remus rolled his eyes. "Sirius, it was the _first week of classes._ We've barely even _done_ anything yet." He said.

Sirius pointedly turned his head away and grinned. He loved making Remus exasperated at him.

"Yeah, but we have to get up really early in the mornings." Peter complained, dishing mashed potatoes onto his plate. "I hate it. I'm _not_ a morning person."

"Well, that sucks for you, Pete!" James said cheerfully, stealing the spoon from Peter's hand and taking a bite of his mashed potatoes. "Cause I am _definatly_ a morning person, and I am on a crusade to rid the world of those silly night people. I'll get Sirius first, cause no one would really miss him - "

" - Thanks, mate, really appriciate it - "

" - and you'd definatly be next, Peter. And that would be a pity, cause I was starting to like you guys." James finished, shaking his head mock-solemnly. "I hate for it to end this way, but our human race won't survive without morning people."

"James, I'm too hungry to be dealing with your warped sense of humor right now." Peter said, snatching his spoon back from James. "Get your own potatoes, these are mine."

"You _all_ are crazy." Remus said, shaking his head. "Can we just have a quiet, normal meal in peace for once?"

"Nope!" Sirius said happily, ruffling Remus's hair. Remus smacked Sirius's hand away, but smiled all the same. "C'mon, Remus, we're just joking. Relax a little!"

Remus just sighed. He seemed to be doing that a lot over the past week. "Whatever, Sirius." Remus said, really sounding more fond than anything.

HPHPHPHPHP

The next morning, Sirius woke with a groan to the curtians being pulled violently back on his four poster. Without opening his eyes, he _hmmphed_ and pulled his pillow over his eyes to block out the sunlight. "James, I swear to merlin if that's you, I'm hexing you into oblivion."

The pillow was pulled off of his eyes and he was met with the grinning face of James Potter. "C'mon, mate, where's your sense of fun?" James said, throwing himself on the bed next to Sirius. "You're worse than Peter to wake up in the morning, and that's really saying something."

Sirius just _hmmphed_ again and sat up, glaring at James. "Happy?" he said grumpily. James just grinned and stood up off of Sirius' bed.

Sirius glanced to the side to Remus' bed, and noticed that it was empty. "Where's Remus?" he asked no one in particular.

Peter, who he hadn't noticed was awake until now, sat on the edge of Sirius's bed and yawned. "He's in the shower."

"Oh." Sirius said blankly. He looked over to the other boys. "Have you two ever noticed how Remus never lets anyone see him without clothes on? Like, he gets up early so we don't have to shower together, and he always draws the curtians when he gets dressed."

James just shrugged. "Maybe he's just self-consious. Some blokes are like that, you know."

Just then, the door to the showers opened, and Remus stepped out. He had forgone his school robes, as it was Saturday and he didn't need them, but he was still wearing his long sleeved white button-up shirt. "Remus, mate, there you are!" James said happily, getting up to slap Remus on the back. "Now we can go down to breakfast."

Remus looked at Sirius and Peter, who were still looking considerably grumpy, and raised his eyebrows amusedly at James. "I take it you've started on your mission to abolish late-sleepers, huh?" he asked.

James just shrugged. "It had to happen eventually. Come on, lads. Let's go to breakfast."

After a bit more grumbling from Sirius, the four boys went down to the great hall.

HPHPHPHPHP

Remus sat down at the table and was surprised to see a large, tawny owl land in front of his plate, a piece of paper bound to its leg. Who would be writing to him? Was it a mistake? No, the letter clearly had his name on it.

Remus looked around to see if the other boys had seen, but they were all focused on their breakfast. Remus carefully detatched the letter and unfurled the piece of paper. It wasn't on normal wizard parchment, but rather on a folded-up piece of muggle notebook paper.

 _Remus,_

 _How was your first week at Hogwarts? I hope you're having a wondeful time. It's awfully lonely here, with your father always at work and everything. I do hope you're alright._

 _Anyway, I convinced your father to let me borrow his owl. How is he going to find you, anyway? I mean, it's just an owl, how is it going to know where you are? I hope it doesn't get lost._ _I don't understand wizard things at all._

 _Anyway, let me know how you're doing, Remus. I know that the full moon is next week, so let me know if you're okay afterwards._

 _Lots of love,_

 _Mum_

Remus smiled. He hadn't exactly expected his mum _not_ to write, but he was still pleasantly surprised that she had remembered him even when he was gone. He knew for sure that his father wouldn't write. His father could barely even look at him anymore.

Sirius peered over Remus' shoulder, clearly trying to catch a peek at the letter. "Who's the letter from?" Sirius asked curiously.

Remus quickly folded up the letter and hastily stowed it in his pants pocket. "Just my mum." He said shortly, offering no further explaination.

James frowned. "I thought your mum was ill?" He questioned.

"Not so ill that she can't pick up a pencil, James."

James coughed. "...Yeah. Right. Sorry. Stupid question."

Remus just smiled and rolled his eyes. "I'm gonna go reply to this." Remus said, putting his fork down and holding his arm out to his father's owl. The owl eyes hin suspiciously for a moment, before hesitantly going to rest on his arm.

Remus got up from his chair and exited the great hall, slowly making his way to the owlry. The owl on his arm hooted indignantly, as if upset that it was being forced to deliver a letter written by a werewolf.

Remus rolled his eyes at the owl. "Stay still." He scolded. The owl just screeched and dug its claws sharply into Remus' arm.

Remus sighed as he went up the stairs and opened the door to the owlry. There was a faint breeze and a strong smell straw, but Remus rather liked it. It was nice and peacful.

All of the owls peered down at him from their stands, eyeing him reproachfully. Remus ignored them and went to the front of the room, pulling out a parchment and quill, and he began to write.

 _Dear mum,_

 _Hogwarts is wonderful so far! I've learned loads of new things already, you wouldn't believe it. And don't worry about the owls, they know where to go._

 _I'm good at most of my classes, but I'm absolute rubbish at potions. I ended up melting my cauldron. Professer Slughorn wasn't too amused, but he gave me another one anyway._

 _I've made a few friends here. They're a bit crazy, but very nice. Sometimes. You'd probably think they're a bad influence on me._

 _I'll write you again after the full moon. I don't want you to worry, I'll be perfectly fine. I always have been before, and you didn't even have magic to heal me._

 _Love,_

 _Remus_

Remus was folding up the now finished letter into a tight scroll when the door to the owlry opened. Lily Evans entered the room, clutching a letter to her chest.

She smiled when she saw him. "Hello, Remus." She said, giving a happy little wave before finding the nearest owl and tying the letter to its leg. "Funny way of delivering letters, isn't it?" She said, gesturing absently to the owls around her. "My mother was shocked when I got my first letter. She was just washing the dishes when suddenly an owl was at her window!" She laughed and Remus smiled.

"So is that who you're writing to, then? Your mum?" Remus asked, tying the scroll to the owl's leg and letting it soar out of the window.

"My whole family. My parents, and my sister." Lily replied, taking her owl to the window and letting it fly off. "Shall we walk down together?"

"Sure." Remus agreed.

They exited the owlry, chatting happily about last week's classes and what they were hoping to learn. They were on their way to the Gryffindor tower when Remus and Lily rounded the corner and found themselves face to face with two Slytherins.

One of them, the male one, scowled. "What are you two Gryffindors doing down here?" He sneered.

Remus raised his eyebrows. "Well, we go to school here, you see." He replied sarcastically. He attemted to walk past them when suddenly the other one, the female with bushy black hair, grabbed his arm.

"Wait a moment. _You're_ the ond who's friends with my dear cousin Sirius, aren't you?" She said in disgust, looking Remus through her heavy-lidded eyes. "Of course, a filthy blood-traitor, just like him."

Remus blinked slightly in surprise. " _You're_ Sirius' cousin?" He asked. He could not think of two people who were less similar. This girl radiated pure-blood perfection, much like Sirius did when they had first met him, but there was something much crueler and more maniacal in her stormy grey eyes, so similar to Sirius'.

"That's what I just said, you idiot." She spat, twisting Remus's arm to the side and smirking when he let out a small yelp of pain.

Lily stepped up bravely next to Remus and glared at the girl. "Leave him alone, he didn't do anything to you!" She said angrily, her hands on her hips.

The girl narrowed her eyes at Lily furiously. "No one asked for _your_ opinion, you filthy little mudblood."

 _Mudblood..._ Remus felt like he had heard the word before, and he had a feeling that it meant something very bad, but he could not remember. Remus saw Lily blink slightly in confusion, and he could tell she was also wondering what the word meant.

"Is there a problem here?" Said a voice behind them. Remus whipped around to see professer Flitwick standing at the end of the corridor. "You're not fighting, I hope?"

The girl twisted up her face into a scowl and released Remus' arm. Remus winced and rubbed it, feeling the cresent moon-shaped marks that her long fingernails had made. "No, Professer." She said haughtily before she and her partner left the hallway.

Professer Flitwick sighed and turned to face Lily and Remus. "You two best head back to your common room, breakfast is already over." He said to them.

"Yes, professer." Lily said quickly. She grabbed Remus's arm gently and pulled him down the hall.

Once they were walking again, Lily turned to Remus and asked, "Do you know what a 'mudblood' is?"

Remus shrugged. "No clue." He said honestly. "Some sort of wizard insult, probably. I'll ask Sirius."

Lily wrinkled her nose in distaste. "Why do you spend time with those awful boys, Remus?" She asked curiously. "You seem like the type of person that wouldn't want anything to do with them."

Remus shrugged again. "They're my dorm mates, and they're nice to me." They arrived at the portrait hole and said the password, both climbing inside. Sirius, James, and Peter were sitting around the round table in the common room, a deck of exploding snaps in Sirius' lap.

Sirius turned and beamed when he saw Remus. "Remus, mate!" he called, waving him over enthusiastically. "Come play exploding snaps with us!"

"I think I'm going to get some homework done. Bye, Remus." Lily said, waving to him before climbing up the stairs to the girls dormotory.

Remus sat in the armchair next to Sirius. Sirius grinned and said, "So, you gonna play exploding snaps? James has already lost twice, and he's already fried off part of his hair."

James scowled at him. "Shut it. I wasn't the one who singed my eyebrows off when we were playing yesterday and threw a hissy fit until madam Pomphrey grew them back."

Sirius did not look remotely embarrased. "I stand by my actions." He said with dignity, handing Remus the deck of cards with a wink. "You deal, Remus."

Remus began to deal out the cards. He decided he would bring up the encounter that he and Lily bad with the Slytherins. "I had a run in with someone who claimed to be your cousin, Sirius." He said, a determined casualness in his voice.

Sirius' head snapped up and he looked at Remus sharply. "What? Who was it?" He asked quickly.

"I... I don't know. I don't know her name." Remus said.

Sirius sighed. "Was it a Slytherin girl? Bushy black hair? Pureblood brattiness? Sucks the happiness out of your soul with one look?"

"Er... yeah?"

Sirius groaned. "That," Sirius said grimly, "Was my dear cousin Bellatrix. She's completly mental, that one. I'm sorry, Remus."

"What do you mean you 'had a run in' with her?" James said anxiously. "What happened?"

Remus shrugged. "Nothing much. She twisted my arm a bit which hurt, but I'm fine, and she called Lily something, I think it was 'mudblood' - "

Peter choked on the mug of tea he was drinking, and James jumped in surprise, the cards in his lap exploding loudly. Sirius didn't look surprised at all, just very grim.

How _dare_ she?!" James said furiously, ignoring his hair, which was singed and smoking at the ends. "Sirius, your _cousin_ said that?!"

"Yeah. Told you, my family's not the most pleasent bunch."

"Um..." Remus interjected, now feeling quite confused, "Would someone care to explain to me _what_ exactlt a mudblood is? And James, why are you so upset? I thought you hated Lily Evans."

James looked darkly at Remus. "I _do_ hate Evans, but what Sirius' mental cousin called her is one of the worst things you can say to someone in the wizarding world." He explained.

"It means dirty blood." Peter said, looking quite pale now, "It's a name for people with muggle parents."

"That's awful!" Remus said tremulously, looking genuinly distraught. "I should go talk to Lily..." Remus said, starting to rise from his place in his armchair.

James siezed Remus' arm and pulled him forcfully back into his chair. "You can't go, Remus! We need your help planning." He said, putting the rest of the exploding snap cards cautiously on the table.

"Planning? Planning what?" Remus said, thouroughly confused.

Sirius, who had already seemed to catch what James was suggesting, said, "Our prank to get back at them! Duh!" He said it as though it was the most obvious thing in the world.

Remus groaned and buried his face in his hands. "No. No, no, no, _no,_ Sirius. I am not engaging in anymore juvenile activity with the two of you. Wasn't your stunt at the welcoming feast enough? I feel bad enough for doing that as it is."

"That was a _week_ ago, Remus." Sirius whined. "We can get back at the piles of dung that I call my family, and at the same time we can pull our second prank as a group! Two birds with one stone!"

Remus just sighed into his hands. "...You two are going to do it even if I tell you not to, aren't you?" He asked exasperatedly.

"Yep!" James said cheerfully.

Remus, afted a long, dramatic sigh, slowly sat up. "Alright," he said, sounding incredibly resigned, "If you guys are going to engage in this active stupidity no matter what, I might as well moniter to make sure you don't do anything _too_ crazy."

"Yay!" Sirius cheered, throwing a fist in the air. "Remus is helping us!"

"Don't get used to it." Remus warned, getting up from his chair and heading towards the dorms. "I'm only here to make sure that you lot don't end up commiting Slytherincide."

"Hey! Where are you going?" James called as Remus started to walk up the spiral staircase to the dorms.

Sirius could practically hear the eye-roll in Remus' voice when he answered. "I'm getting spell-books, you idiot. How you intend to plan a prank if you don't know any spells?"

James looked down sheepishly as Remus dissapeared and came back with a small stack of books.

"Why do you have all of those books in your trunk?" Peter asked curiously as Remus tipped all of the books onto the table.

Remus flushed slightly. "I get bored." He said, almost somewhat defensively, before thrusting a book into James' hand. "This is a transfiguration book. You look for something in here, since your the best at transfiguration."

James looked slightly smug as he opened the book and dissapeared into it.

Remus handed Sirius and Peter two other books, and the four boys set to work on their first prank against the Slytherins.

HPHPHPHPHP

"Found it!" James cried triumphantly several hours later, slamming his fist on the table, startling the other three boys.

"What did you find?" Sirius asked, closing Remus' book and placing on the table.

A mischievious grin lit up James' face as he read the description of the spell again. "It's brilliant! It transfigures ordinary school robes into tutus!"

"...Tutus?" Sirius said, a slow grin spreading across his face. "As in those pink, frilly dresses that four year old muggle girls wear to dance?"

"Yep." James said, looking proud of himself as he showed Sirius the spell. "It's a third year spell, but I think that with my transfiguration genius and Remus' nerdiness, we can pull it off."

Remus huffed indignantly, but didn't comment.

"So what are we planning to do with this spell?" Peter asked, tossing the book he had been half-heartedly searching through on the table.

The wicked grin went across James' face again. "So my plan is, tomorrow at the great hall, when all of the Slytherins are at the table, we can all cast the spell together. It's a mass transfiguration spell, so if we all do it correctly, all of the Slytherins will be dressed in pink tutus."

Sirius and Peter laughed, and Remus cracked a reluctant smile. "That's absolutly brilliant. We just need to learn the spell by tomorrow, then!" Sirius said excitedly.

"I don't think I'll be able to do it." Peter said sadly. "I'm rubbish at transfiguration."

"Don't worry, Pete, we'll help you learn it." James said kindly, patting Peter on the shoulder. "Just think of all of those Slytherins in pink tutus, and you can do it."

"I'm _not_ doing it." Remus said firmly, standing up and gathering his books that had been strewn about the table. "I already helped you find the spell for your idiotic prank, you can't make me help you anymore."

HPHPHPHPHP

 **Ahaha, poor Remus! They're not going to let him skip out on this prank, are they? Haha**

 **This chapter felt a bit shorter than the others, but the next chapter will definatly have the prank, I promise. I tried to make this chapter have a bit more of Sirius' POV, but I was just having to much fun with Remus XD sorry.**

 **The prank idea was** **from Vampiregirl0421** **, I just modified it a tiny bit, so thank you.**

 **And to answer the question from Jezgirl, don't worry, you're not being bossy. In fact, feel free to be as bossy as you want, because I'll take any new ideas. But anyway, James will get the invisibility cloak soon, don't worry ;) The map won't be made for a while, but it definatly will happen. I don't want to spoil too much...**

 **As always, hope you enjoyed, please review, and I'll see you soon!**


	5. Chapter five - Pink, Frilly Slytherins

"Why on earth did I let you drag me into this?" Remus moaned as they walked to the great hall the next day, all of the wielding their wands, prepared to try their new robe-changing spell on the unsuspecting Slytherins. After a lot of nagging from James and some disturbingly cute puppy-dog eyes from Sirius, Remus had finally given up and said he would do the prank with them, against much of his better judgment.

Sirius grinned. "Come on Remus, you know you love us." When Remus just huffed exasperatedly, Sirius slung his arm casually around Remus' shoulder amd ruffled his hair. Remus stiffened at the contact.

Sirius quickly withdrew his arm as if he had been burned. "Sorry, Remus, did I hurt you? Are you okay?" He said concernedly, quickly looking at Remus' sleeved arms for any signs of injuries.

Remus just winced slightly. After years of almost no physical contact from anybody, save for his mother, having his friend just casually throw an arm around his shoulder was quite disconcerning. Remus quickly shook his head and said, "S-sorry, Sirius. You just surprised me, is all."

Sirius still looled a bit concerned, but decided to let it go. If Remus said nothing was wrong, then he should drop it.

They all arrived at the doors to the great hall. James stood outside of it with his hands on his hips, a massive grin on his face. "This, my fellow Gryffindors, is going to be brilliant." He declared with a mishcievious smirk. "Here we go. Now, we need to act natural." James gave them all a pointed look before opening the doors to the great hall.

They all entered the great hall together. Sirius quickly plastered a look of bored annoyance on his face and started grumbling about morning people, as to not cause any suspicion.

They were some of the last people to enter the great hall, so everyone else was already sitting at their tables, including Bellatrix and Nott, the other boy that had been with her yesterday.

The four boys sat down at the Gryffindor table like usual. James pulled his wand out from inside his robes and aimed it at the Slytherins. "Ready?" He whispered to his three counterparts. The all nodded and drew their respective wands. "Alright, we'll all do it on the count of three..." James murmured again, talking through the corner of his mouth as to not be spotted. "One... Two... Three!"

Sirius squeezed his eyes tightly shut, and all four boys waved their wands and murmured the robe-switching spell. There was a collective gasp, and Sirius opened his eyes to see if the spell had worked.

It had. There was now a table of confused, angry, tutu-clad Slytherins sitting at the table across the hall. They all glanced down at their robes and let out exclaimations of horror. The whole hall was silent for a moment, and then everybody burst into laughter.

Sirius tried to hold himself together for a few seconds, but one sight of Snivellus in a frilly, pink tutu which clashes horribly with his greasy black hair made Sirius collapse onto the table in hystarical fits of laughter.

The other boys weren't fairing much better. James had somehow ended up on the floor on all fours, and was banging his fists on the ground. Peter had collapsed against Rebecca Browyns' lap, who had squealed and scooted a good foot away from him. Remus, however, put on a surprisingly convincing look of dissaproving annoyance, though Sirius could tell that he was barely refraining from laughing. "Honestly, what an idiotic prank." Remus said loudly to Lily Evans, sending a small wink to Sirius

"Alright, alright - SILENCE!!" Professer McGonnagal roared, causing the noises to slowly disperse, although James and Sirius were still shaking from silent giggles.

Professer McGonnagal was staring around the great hall with a furious expression on her face. "Who are the marauders responsible for this?!" She demanded. The hall was deathly silent, save for the few angry hisses still coming from the tutu-clad Slytherins. "No one is going to fess up?"

When still no one spoke, Professer McGonnagal sighed. "Slytherins, come to the front of the hall so I can sort out your robes. Everyone else, you are dismissed."

The rest of the students quicjly scurried out of the great hall, not wanting to endure the wrath of McGonnagal. James Sirius, Remus, and Peter all quickly ducked into an empty classroom, then they burst into laughter.

"That was... bloody... brilliant!" Sirius choked out between tears of laughter. He threw his arm around Remus again. "Come on, Remus. Just tell me that wasn't fun."

Remus had a huge grin on his face. It was the most Sirius had ever seen Remus smile since they had met. The smile lit up his whole tired, scarred face. "Okay, I'll admit, that was pretty amazing." He said, smirking.

"Yay! We've succesfully corrupted Remus!" James cheered, throwing a fist triumphantly in the air. "Welcome to the dark side, Remus. We're glad to have you."

"Don't get used to me helping you, James. This was a one-time thing." Remus warned, though the huge smile on his face slightly ruined the effect.

"Sure it was, Remus." Peter said, patting Remus on the shoulder. "We should get back to Gryffindor tower now, or people will get suspicious."

"Yeah, let's go." The four boys made their way back to the Gryffindor tower, still gloating in the success of their prank. When they arrived and clambered into the portrait hole, they saw that a majority of the Gryffindors were still chortiling about the prank.

They sat on the couch next to Frank Longbottom, who was still grinning from ear to ear. "That was brilliant, wasn't it?" He asked the boys appriciativly. "I wonder who it was."

The four boys exchanged glances. "...Yeah. Me too."

HPHPHPHPHP

Remus woke up in Monday morning and felt a vauge throbbing in his head and a queasiness in his stomach. Remus groaned. With all the excitement of the prank that they had pulled at hand, he had completly forgotten that the full moon was tomorrow. The pain wasn't terrible now, but Remus was sure that by tomorrow it would be torturous.

He wanted nothing more than to curl back up in the blankets and go back to sleep, but instead Remus hauled himself out of bed and started up the shower. He stayed in there longer than he usually did, hoping that he could scrub the grogginess out of his face. It did little to help.

When Remus exited the bathroom, fully dressed and ready for class, he saw James sitting on the foot of his bed, tugging his black school shoe over his socked foot.

"Hey, Remus, there you are." James said, flashing Remus a quick grin. "I was just wondering whether you..." James trailed off when he saw Remus' face. He frowned. "Are you alright, Remus? You look a bit ill." James got off of his bed and examined Remus' face critically. "Yeah, you're definatly paler than usual. You should see Madam Pomphrey.

Remus attemted a small smile, which he hoped didn't look like a grimace. "I'm fine, James, I've just got a bit of a cold. Nothing to worry about." He said quickly, giving James a quick pat on the shoulder. "Now, go wake Sirius."

James threw a sock at him. "I woke Sirius yesterday, it's your turn!"

"No, Peter woke Sirius yesterday, you just sat on your bed and threw a quill at him when he sat up."

James let out an exaaperated sigh and cautiously approached Sirius' sleeping form. Over the past week, deciding who had to wake up Sirius had become ome of the most commom arguments amomg the boys, mainly because they didn't feel like getting hexed by an angry, half asleep Sirius. It was a rather copius task, no doubt.

Jamed hesitated for a moment before prodding Sirius' shoulder, then quickly leaping back as if he expected Sirius to explode.

Sirius let out an exagerrated moan of anguish and rolled right off of his bed onto the ground. He landed with a small thump under all of his blankets. "I'm not going to class today." Sirius declared behind the bedsheets that he had been buried in.

James rolled his eyes and prodded Sirius with his toe again. "Get up, you git. Quit being such a drama queen."

Sirius sat up and tore the bedsheet of of himself, looking indignant. "What do you mean, 'drama queen'? I'm super manly!"

"Okay, first of all," Remus interjected, "You're 11 years old, Sirius, you can't be 'manly'. And second, you use at least 5 different products to style your hair in the morning. Forgive us if we're not trembling at the sight of you."

Sirius just huffed exasperstedly, stood up, and stalked off to the bathroom.

Remus turned to James. "Where's Pete?" He asked, looking around for the sandy-haired marauder.

"Peter decided that we were taking too long to get ready, so he went down to breakfast." James said, digging through his trunk and pulling out his transfiguration book. "He got hungry and impatient."

Remus nodded absently, pulling his transfiguration book out of his bag as Sirius stormed out of the bathroom dramatically, his hair styled neatly.

"Let'a go, lads." Sirius said, and the three boys went down to the great hall to find Peter.

They found Peter sitting at the Gryffindor table, almost done with breakfast and looking rather ill-tempered. "You two took ages" Peter complained, standing up from his chair.

James snatched two pieces of toast off of a large silver serving plate and tossed one to Remus. "Don't look at me. Sirius was the one who took 10 years to style his hair."

Sirius scowled and snatched the toast from James' hands. "At least I make an _attempt_ to tame my hair, James."

James grinned cheekily and ruffled his hair exaggeratedly, making it look even more ridiculous than usual. "What can I say? It's the Potter genes."

Sirius snorted as they all walked to transfiguration.

They all entered the transfiguration classroom and sat in their usual seats - in the very front. Sirius stuffed the last of his toast into his mouth as McGonnagal entered the classroom.

"Alright, you all." She said briskly, settling at her desk. "Since most of you were unsuccessful in transfiguring your matches last week, we are going to - "

McGonnagal then caught sight of Remus' face and her eyes furrowed in concern. "Mister Lupin, are you quite alright? You're looking a bit ill." She said.

Remus gulped. Didn't McGonnagal remember that tomorrow was the full moon? What was he going to say? "Professer, I'm fine. Just feeling a bit under the weather." He said nervously with a furtive glance out of the window.

McGonnagal's eyes widened in understanding. "Yes, of course, Mister Lupin. I hope you feel well again soon." She cleared her throat and turned to the rest of the class. "Now, I'm going to pass around these matches, and I expect them all to be needles by the end of this class..."

Sirius gave Remus a concerned look. Remus responded with a shrug and half-smile. "You gonna be okay, Rem?" He whispered, putting a hand on Remus' arm and squeezing lightly

Remus smiled at his shortened nickname. "I'm alright, Sirius." Remus whispered back. "I'll be alright."

HPHPHPHP

 **I know, I know, this chapter was super short, I KNOW. But I wanted the day of the full moon to be its own chapter, and that'll probably be pretty long.** **I really like writing full moon scenes. Before I started on , I used to write nothing but full moon stuff in my notepad. So, that's why I want to make it by itself.** **Anyway, as always, please review. Any idead, feedback, constructuve critisism, whatever. I just want reviews haha.** **Anyway, see you soon!**


	6. Chapter six - The First Full Moon

A/N: So before I start the chapter, I wanted to say that I just now realized that I have been spelling "McGonagall" wrong this whole time... oops! It'll probably be fixed in the next couple days...

HPHPHPHP

When Remus woke up the next morning, he felt ten times worse than he had felt yesterday. It felt like someone was repeatedly casting a slicing hex inside of his stomach, and his head felt like it was about to pound out of his skull. It was no different then any other full moon, but today he actually had to do stuff instead of just resting around the house like he did before.

Remus slowly stood from his bed and made his way unsteadily to the bathroom. He took a quick glance in the mirror and winced. There were dark blue-black smudges under his eyelids, which stood out in stark contrast to his paler-than-usual skin. He had a sheen of perspiration on his forehead, and his glassy amber eyes were slightly glazed over, as if he was not completly in tune with reality. In short, he looked extremly sick.

Remus sighed and combed his hand self-consiously through his hair, hoping that it would make him look like less of a mess. It really didn't help. If James and Sirius got concerned yesterday because he looked a little bit pale, what were they going to say now?

Remus heard the farmiliar bustling about and grumbling about morning people from outside of the door, and knew that the other three must be up by now. He closed his eyes, braced himself, and threw open the door.

"Remus! There you - " Sirius quickly stopped speaking, his eyes widening as he caught sight of Remus. "Bloody hell, mate!" He exclaimed. "You look awful!"

Remus managed a slightly rueful smile. "Thanks, Sirius." He said sarcastically, his lips quirked up. "You really know how to raise someone's self-esteem."

None of them cracked a smile. "Seriously, Remus, you should go to the hospital wing." James said worriedly, placing his hand on Remus' cheek. Remus shivered and leaned into the touch. "You're burning up, Remus."

"Really, lads, I'm okay." Remus tried to say reassuringly, gently prising James' hand off of his cheek and wiping his forehead on the back of his sleeve.

"You don't look okay, Remus." Peter said, his face scrunched up in concern.

"Yeah." Sirius repeated, standing up and sliding his arm under Remus' to support him. "We're going to the hospital wing."

Remus wanted nothing more than to obey Sirius and allow himself to be led to the hospital wing, but instead he pushed Sirius' arm back down. "No. I'm going to classes. I can't miss them. " Suddenly, he remembered something. His excuse for leaving! He had almost forgotten. "And besides, I have to visit my mother tonight." He added.

"Skip the visit then, Remus." Sirius said. "She'll understand."

"No, I can't. She's seriously ill, and she needs my help." Remus said stubbornly.

Sirius gave an angry huff. "Alright, fine." He conceded, going back to his bed and pulling on his shoes. "But the minute you start to feel ill, we're taking you right to the hospital wing."

"No arguments." Peter added, grabbing Sirius' arm and tugging him off of the bed.

Remus rolled his eyes half-heartedly. "Yeah, yeah." He said as they all exited the dorm and clambered down the spiral staircase.

HPHPHPHP

"Sirius, for the thousandth time, I feel _fine._ " Remus lied stubbornly as they entered the charms room for their last class of the day. Sirius, who could be very stubborn if he wanted to, had decided to pester Remus every five minutes about 'Are you sure you're okay, Rem? 'You still look peaky, mate.' and 'Shouldn't you go to the hospital wing, Remus?' Remus appriciated the concern, but it was rather aggrivating.

Sirius held up his hands in mock-surrender. "I'm just worried about you, Remus." He said.

"I gathered that." Remus snapped grumpily as he collapsed into his chair in the front of the classroom. Sirius went silent and looked down at his desk, looking slightly hurt. Remus sighed. "Hey, I'm sorry, Sirius. I didn't mean to snap at you."

Sirius gave Remus a grin. "It's all good, Rem." He said, ruffling Remus' hair affectionatly, making Remus half-heartedly scowl and flatten it out again. "I'm just looking out for you."

HPHPHPHPHP

Charms felt like it was dragging on for hours. Remus usually enjoyed charms, but he could not bring himself to fully participate when he was already too busy pretending not to he sick so that Sirius wouldn't explode with worry.

So, when the class was finally, finally over, Remus somehow managed to drag himself out of his chair and follow his friends to the great hall without stumbling too much. But the moment that he entered the great hall, he almost gagged and stepped back at all of the noises and smells there were. His senses felt like they were magnified by one hundred, and the smell of all of the different foods in the hall were combining and making a sickly barrage on Remus' sensitive nose.

Remus stood in the doorway for a moment to gather himself, and then said, "E-er, lads, I gotta run... gotta go visit my mother..."

The all turned to him, the concern clear in their eyes. Remus wished that they weren't so concerned about him. It made him feel so much worse. "Okay, Remus." James finally said carefully. "But if you change your mind and want to stay, I'm sure that your mum will understand."

Remus attempted a smile and an eyerole. "Okay, James." He said, patting James on the shoulder before hurriedly bolting out of the great hall, leaving the other three standing worriedly behind him.

HPHPHPHP

Remus stopped in front of the doors to the hospital wing and took a moment to catch his breath, leaning against the door and breathing heavily. The sunset was getting closer, and it was all Remus could do to force oxygen into his unwilling lungs, then expel it out in great huffs.

He slowly sat up again and threw open the doors to the hospital wing. He glanced around at the crisp white beds, but Madam Pomfrey was nowhere to be seen.

"Madan Pomfrey?" He called softly, wincing as he heard how raspy his own voice was sounding.

He saw Madam Pomfrey hurriedly rush out of a room in the back of the wing, looking purse-lipped and irritated. The expression quickly melted when she saw Remus.

"Oh, Mister Lupin, dear." She said kindly, walking up to him. "I've been expecting you. You're ready to go to the willow?" Remus nodded, feeling too exhausted to speak.

Madam Pomfrey seemed to notice this, and grabbed Remus' arm, allowing Remus to lean against her as they walked. He shivered as she put her free hand on her forehead.

She frowned. "You're awfully hot, Mister Lupin. Is it always like this?" She asked. "I'm sorry, but I've never taken care of a werewolf before, so I'm afraid I don't know too much about them."

 _Lucky you_ , Remus thought, a bit too weakly to be bitter. Instead, he said, "It's okay, Madam Pomfrey. It's always like this before the moon."

Madam Pomfrey's frown deepened, and she didn't look at all reassured. But she just clicked her tounge slightly before continuing down the hall. She creaked open the doors to the castle and leading Remus out into the chilly evening air. Remus shivered and drew his ratty cloak further over his shoulders.

Madam Pomfrey led Remus over to the whomping willow, which was whipping wildly in the breeze. "Now watch this, Remus." She whispered before drawing her wand and pointing it at a stick laying in the grass. "Whingardium leviosa." she said clearly, making the stick waft lazily above the ground and prod a large knot at the base of the tree.

Suddenly, the tree froze. "Come on now, through here." She said, pointing at a small passage was near the base of the tree. Remus followed her into the passage. It was dark and smelled faintly of wood and damp earth.

The passage went on for a while. Remus was almost starting to think that it would never end when he suddenly landed with a soft _oomph!_ on a hard-wood floor.

Remus glanced around uncertianly. They seemed to be in a small shack, with a creaking staircase that appeared to lead to a bedroom. "Where are we?" he rasped to Madam Pomfrey.

"The shrieking shack." Madam Pomfrey said. "It's a small shack on the edge of Hogsmead. Albus has spread a rumor that ghosts haunt the shack, so people won't get supicious of the... howling."

Remus felt an extra sharp stap inside his stomache and groaned. "Madam Pomfrey, you should leave." He managed to force out. "Moonrise is soon."

"Good luck, Remus." She whispered back sadly before climbing back up the secret passage.

Remus only just managed to stumble up the rickety staircase into the small bedroom and shed his robes into a small wardrobe on the side of the room before collapsing on the dusty four-poster bed, gasping in pain as his brain hammered onto the back of his skull.

All he could do was wait, his thoughts and excruciating pain the only thing he had to accompany him. He could already feel the wolf creeping into his brain, but he fought desperatly against it.

A beam of moonlight suddenly pierced the dusty floor, and Remus let out a shriek of agony as he felt the muscled under his skin start to twitch and jerk, preparing itself for the change. Remus cried out as the fur forced its way out of his skin like needles.

He could vaugly feel the snaps of his bones as they realigned themselves to fit his new body, but most of his brain was taken up by the red, hot, fury as the wolf told him to _kill kill kill KILL! want bloodbloodbloodblood BLOOD!_

Remus tilted his head to the sky and howled, no longer Remus anymore.

He was a werewolf.

HPHPHPHPHP

"Sirius. Sirius!" James said loudly, waving his hand in front of his best friend's face as they sat in front of the fire in the now deserted Gryffindor tower. "Blimey, mate, you've been out of it all evening. What's going on?"

Sirius had been oddly quiet all evening, staring into space or into his lap while James and Peter played exploding snaps or worked on their homework.

Sirius just sighed and grabbed the sides of his hair, tugging on it with his fists. "We shouldn't have let Remus leave." He said. "We should have made him stay. He's ill."

"Is that what you've been worried about this whole time?" Peter asked, scratching out a sentence on his transfiguration essay.

"Sirius, we can't just force Remus to stay." James said patiently, placing an exploding snap card on the top of the precarious card house that he was building. "If he's stubborn about leaving, there's nothing we can do to stop him."

Sirius just huffed and slammed his head loudly on the table, causing a large blot of ink to stain Peter's parchment and making James' card house burst into flames.

James smacked Sirius on the arm as he hastily smothered the fire with his Gryffindor duvet. "Now look what you've done, you git!" He said in an annoyed voice, gesturing to his ruined card house.

Sirius just lifted his head off of the table and looked at his lap, a sulky expression on his face.

James' face softened a bit, and he put a hand on Sirius' arm. "Hey, I'm sorry, mate." He said, giving Sirius' arm a little squeeze. "I know that you're worried about him. But he's already gone, and there's nothing we can do. And if Remus was seriously ill, I'm sure Professer McGonagall would't let him leave."

"Yeah..." Sirius said slowly, tugging on his hair again, "Yeah, you're probably right." He stood up and walked toward the spiral staircase. "I'm gonna go to bed."

"Alright. See you soon, Sirius."

HPHPHPHP

 _Pain. Agony_. Those were the first things that came to Remus' mind when his brain slowly swam to consiousness the next morning. He let out a pitiful whimper of pain and forced his eyes open.

He was lying on a hardwood floor, staring at a scratched-up wooden bedpost. _Where was he...?_

Then he remembered. Madam Pomfrey. Shrieking shack. Transformation. _Werewolf._

Remus slowly extended a bloody hand to grip the leg on the bedpost tightly, then he hauled himself to his feet. The room swayed alarmingly and he clenched his teeth tightly. _I will not pass out, I will not pass out, I will not pass out_ , he repeated the farmiliar mantra in his head. A large slash across his lower chest seemed to be the worst of the injuried, but his entire body was littered with large scratches and teeth marks.

He vaugely realized that underneath all of the pain, he was shivering. He forced his feet to move, one in front of the other, until he reached the wardrobe where he had put his robe. He tugged it out and wrapped it around his shivering body.

The room spun again and Remus clutched the dresser tightly, letting out a small groan of pain. _I will not pass out, I will not_ -

"Mister Lupin?" Remus heard Madam Pomfrey calling for him from the bottom of the stairway. "Are you awake?"

Remus' throat was scratchy amd hoarse, but he managed to rasp out, "Yep. Up here, Madam Pomfrey." He heard the creaking of the hard wood floor as Madam Pomfrey made her way up the stairs and into the bedroom.

"Goodness me!" She cried when she saw Remus, forgetting her proffesional demeanor for a moment. She looked horrified at the sheer number of injuries that Remus was sporting. "We need to heal you up, right now." She quickly conjured a stretcher below Remus (which was good, because Remus wasn't sure how much longer he could stand up) and she levitated him out of the secret passage and through the castle to the hospital wing.

"Now, I'll go get you a pain potion and some dittany." She said quickly as soon as Remus was layed on a bed, and she stalked off, soon returning with a vial that she thrust in Remus' hand. "Drink. It'll probably make you pretty drowsy, so feel free to go to sleep while I'm healing you."

Remus downed the small vial in one gulp, and felt a wonderful sleepiness wash over him. All he wanted to do was close his eyes and take a quick nap...

HPHPHPHPH

Sirius groaned and smacked his head on the table as they sat in history of magic, attempting to listen to Professer Binns drone on about goblin wars or... something.

"I don't understand why I have to be the one to take notes." He whispered grumplily to James, who was playing hangman with Peter on a scrap bit of parchment and not listening to a word of the lecture.

" _Because,_ " James said, patting Sirius on the shoulder, "Remus usually takes notes in this class, and he'll be furious with us if we don't do it for him. Pete's rubbish at taking notes, and my handwriting is too messy. So that leaves you."

"Yeah mate." Peter said, writing a letter down on his parchment. "You're writing is all loopy and stuff, and James' looks like two toddlers fighting over a quill."

"Gits." Sirius muttered, writing down another date on his paper.

Sirius had never been so relieved to hear the lunch bell. He stuffed his crumpled notes into his bag, slung it over his shoulder, and rushed to the great hall with James and Peter.

"Finally!" He said, dropping into his seat at the great hall and casually propping his feet on the table. "I don't know how Remus managed to take notes in Binns' class, it's bloody exhausting."

Lily, who was a few seats down from Peter, wrinkled her nose. "Get your feet off the table, Black." She said with a scowl. "Do you have no manners?"

"I _do_ have manners!" Sirius said indignantly. "I just choose to ignore them."

"Oh, honestly!" She huffed, flicking her hair over her shoulder before standing up and stalking out of the great hall.

"You'd have thought she'd have learned that we're idiots by now." James said with a shrug, reaching for a handful of potato chips. "I mean, all she does is - "

"Remus!" Sirius interrupted loudly.

James blinked. "Um, mate, I think taking all of those notes must have made you go mental. I'm James, remember?"

" _No_ , you git - Remus is back!" Sirius said happily, grabbing James' shoulders and turning him around to face the doorway.

Remus was indeed back. He was still standing in the doorway, leaning against the wall with his eyes closed. He looked less ill than he did yesterday, but he looked extremely tired.

"Remus!" Sirius called loudly, raising his arm up.

At the sound of his name, Remus opened his eyes and couldn't help but smile despite his tired condition at Sirius waving his arm frantically in the air in greeting. He slowly made his way over to the table, moving gingerly as to not upset the slash on his chest.

He finally sat carefully at the table next to Sirius and smiled at the other three. "Hey lads." He said, giving a small wave of greeting.

"Hey, Remus. You're looking a bit better." Peter said, reaching out across the table to touch Remus' forehead. "You don't feel sick anymore."

Remus smiled. "Yeah, I'm not ill anymore." He said. "I _told_ you it was nothing to worry about."

The boys continued there meal while chatting cheerfully, fully content to accept the explaination that Remus had just gotten ill, and there was nothing to worry about.

Well, all of them, except Sirius.

He had no idea why, but something looked like it was _off_ with Remus. Remus' posture was careful, his movements were limited, his breaths shallow. Almost as if he was in pain.

And when Remus yawned and threw his head back, Sirius caught sight of a small, bleeding slash just on top of his collerbone.

 _What happened?_

Remus glanced over at Sirius and saw him looking, and Sirius hastily glanced back over at James, who was reanimating a highly unlikely-sounding story about crashing into a muggle helicopter on a broomstick, and pretended he was listening all along.

But his curiosity was still there, and he knew it wouldn't go away until he found out what was wrong.

HPHPHPHPH

 **Chapter's done! Yaay! A lot of people like reading transformation scenes, so I hope this lived up to your expectations!**

 **Anyway, I've decided that every once in a while, I'll reccomend the title of a really good fanfiction that I think people should read. Reason? I feel like it. And with some of these, you have not _lived_ until you have read them.**

 **Such is the case with this first one. It is called "Casting Moonshadows" By Moonsign, and has 83 chapters so far**.

 **If you like marauders era WolfStar fanfics and have not read _"Casting Moonshadows",_ I honestly feel sorry for you because you have not completed your life yet, and you will never know true pain until you have read this fic.**

 **It is rare that I find a full-length marauder fic that has such consistent, _amazing_ characterization of all of the characters, but this is definatly it. It is slightly AU, delightfully angsty, and will have you both laughing and sobbing. It alternated between the POV of Sirius and Remus. It has a bit of a slow build-up, but it is _so_ worth it.** **Anyway, read it! It's amazing and you won't regret it.**

 **Now that I'm done with that completly random advertising for _Casting Moonshadows,_ this author's note is done! Bye bye, y'all!**


	7. Chapter seven - Birth of the Marauders

Not much happened for a few weeks after that. They had more classes that James and Sirius only half-tried in, Remus spent lots of time in the library with Lily when he wanted to get away from Sirius and James for a little while (God knows you couldn't find more loyal friends anywhere, but Remus couldn't deny that they were definatly a handful at times), and overall, the rest of September was fairly _average._

It wasn't until a Sunday morning in early October that the dreaded subject was brought up once again: _pranking._

"Ah, October!" Sirius said, sprawled on his bed in the dormotories, scribbling down notes on his herbology essay. "I love October. The weather is perfect, and we get to have the Halloween feast!"

"I love Halloween." James said absently, twirling a quill in his fingers as he read his charms textbook. "When I was little, my mom used to take me to these enchanted haunted houses down the street."

"Haunted houses, huh?" Peter said, his voice laced with amusment. "Bet those must have terrified you."

"Oh, stuff it, Peter."

"Hey!" Sirius said suddenly, sitting up quickly, his face lit up. "We should do a something for Halloween!"

"Huh? Do what for Halloween?" Remus asked. He already did not like where this was going.

"A prank, Remus!" James said excitedly, also sitting up and slamming his textbook shut with a _bang._ Remus really did wonder sometimes if their brains were connected somehow. "A Halloween prank! We could scare the whole school!"

Remus let out a long, exaggerated sigh. "I should have known it was only a matter of time before your sadistic pleasure of humiliating the Slytherins last month would run out, and you would need to pull another prank to make everyone feel as miserable as possible."

James mocked Remus' long sigh and patted him on the shoulder. "Remus," he said pityingly, shaking his head, "You have absolutly no sense of fun. And besides, we're not going to be humiliating anyone this time. This one is just for a little scare. You have to have fun sometimes."

Remus rolled his eyes, but he was smiling nonetheless. As much as he denied it, he actually really enjoyed pulling pranks with his fellow mischief makers. "Alright, so what did you have in mind, Sirius?" He asked, rolling over to face the raven-haired boy.

Sirius furrowed his eyebrows. "I don't know." Sirius said, scratching his chin in thought. "I didn't really think that far ahead."

"As if you ever do." Remus muttered.

 _"Obviously,"_ Sirius said pointedly, ignoring Remus, "no matter what we do, people can't know it was us. Not only would McGoogles give us detention for the rest of our lives, people wouldn't be nearly as scared if they knew it was just a couple of first years."

"...Well, if we want people to be scared, we could make it seem like it's not even a student?" Peter suggested. "Like, we could make it seem like it was ghosts or spirits or something, and sign it with a fake name."

Surprised silence met this idea. "Pete, that's... that's brilliant!" James said wonderingly.

"Always the tone of surprise."

"Why don't we write a message on the wall?" James suggested. "We could make it all cryptic, and write it in red paint or something, so it looks like blood."

"Hmm..." Remus said thoughtfully, absently shredding the ends of his parchment as he thought. "I think I remember seeing a spell where you can write things in midair with glowing letters. So we could turn off all of the lights and write a message or something?"

Sirius grinned. "Remus, that's brilliant!" He said loudly, grabbing him in a headlock and mussing up his hair.

"Oi!" Remus cried, squirming away from Sirius' grip, red faced and flustered. "Don't get too excited. We still haven't even come up with a prank. _Or_ what we're gonna write."

"Ah, details!" Sirius said, waving his hand dismissivly. "We'll figure it out later. But we should come up with a name now. A secret name to sign the prank with."

Everyone was silent for a moment, all of them no doubt attempting to think of a suitible name.

Peter spoke first. "How about the mischief makers?" He suggested.

"No, we want them to be scared of us." Sirius said, shaking his head. "They'll know it's just a prank if we call ourselves that."

"How about 'The James Potter expiriance'?"

"Mate, I seriously hope you're joking."

"What? It's a great name! Rolls right off the tounge."

"You're an egotistical prat, James."

"Oi!"

"Marauders." Remus, who had not spoken until now, suddenly whispered.

"Huh?" Peter said, breaking from his concentration. "What'd you say, Rem?"

"Marauders." Remus said a little louder, gaining the attention of James and Sirius, making them end their argument. "We could be 'The Marauders.' It's a term usually used to describe pirates, but it could be used to describe mischief makers."

"What made you think of Marauders?" James asked curiously.

"I... I heard McGonagall saying something about 'the marauders that did this' when we pulled that prank last month." Remus said.

"Ah." Sirius said, sitting up and propping his chin in his hand. "Remus, that's a great name. All in favor of The Marauders being our group name?"

"I like it." James said with a shrug.

"Me too. Marauders is it, then, I guess!" Peter said brightly, rolling up his finished essay and putting it in his bag. "Now, can we go to breakfast? I'm really hungry."

HPHPHPHPHP

"I have an idea!" Sirius cried suddenly as they were all sitting by the lake later that day, idly throwing small pieces of bread at the giant squid.

Remus tossed the remainder of his slice of bread with a _splash_ into the water. "What is it?" He asked Sirius.

"So," Sirius began dramatically, sitting up and rubbing his hand together, "So, we extinguish the candles inside the pumpkins so its all dark and spooky, right? What if after that we, like, exploded the pumpkins? We could fill them witg red paint or something the night before the feast, so people will think that they're covered in blood!"

"That would definatly scare everyone! Great idea, mate." James said, clapping Sirius on the shoulder. "Do you think that we can make it happen, Remus? Got any spells that we can use?"

"Hmm.." Remus said, already looking deep in thought, "Well, I'm sure that one of us can find an exploding hex or something for the pumpkins in the library tomorrow when I go to study with Lil - er, Evans. And the charms class is using paint for some of the fourth year lessons, so I'll bet we could nick some of that for fake blood."

"So we could make it happen, then?" Peter asked excitedly, sitting up and propping his feet up on a tree root. "We could really pull this off?"

"If you three are up for learning some more advanced spells, I don't see why not." Remus said calmly.

"Yes! Sirius said happily, punching Remus lightly on the shoulder, not noticing the slight wince when he did so. "Just you three wait, this will be the best prank ever!"

"Agreed." James said with a wide grin. "Hogwarts better look out for the marauders!"

HPHPHPHP

Remus and Lily were both in the library later that day. Lily had asked Remus if he wanted to study with her, and Remus thought that this would be the perfect opportunity to research some spells for thr prank that they were planning. Remus felt a little bit bad that he was lying to Lily about studying, but he was used to lying about things by now.

The moment he told his fellow marauders about the spell to write on the walls, Sirius had demanded that he immidietly go to the library and try to find it. Remus, mainly to get away from his nagging, decided to comply.

"What are you looking for in there, Remus?" Lily asked curiously, looking up from _Hogwarts, a History_ to look at Remus questioningly. "That's a fourth year spell book, isn't it?"

"U-um..." Remus faltered, "Yeah, just going for a bit of... light reading."

Lily laughed. "You're even more of a nerd than I am, Remus." She said kindly, patting Remus on the shoulder. "That's an impressive feat."

He gave her a somewhat sheepish smile and shrugged before looking back down at his book.

Aha! Here it was! Remus peered closer at the spell. Yes, you could write in the air with flaming letters! This would be perfect for their prank

Now that he had found the spell, he was about to close the book and tell Lily that he had to go when suddenly the library door burst open and James and Sirius ran in, huffing and clutching a book to their chest.

"What are _they_ doing in the _library?_ " Lily said dissaprovingly, closing her book and pursing her lips.

"...No clue." Remus said, equally flummoxed. James and Sirius usually avoided the library like the plauge.

Sirius stopped and clasped Remus's shoulder to keep himself upright, breathing heavily. "Remus," He started, "We found the spell to - "

He suddenly cut off when he saw Lily sitting next to Remus at the table. He scowled. "Bugger off, Evans." He said dismissivly. "I need to talk to Remus."

"Oh, that's real nice." Lily huffed, gathering up her books and standing up. "I'll see you later, Remus." She said before giving James and Sirius one last glare and storming off.

Remus frowned as James and Sirius sat next to him. "You shouldn't be so mean to Lily." He repremended slightly as they opened the book.

"But she's annoying." James said. "And she's friends with Snivellus."

Remus just sighed. "Did you find the explosion spell yet?" He asked wearily.

Sirius' face brightened. "Yep!" He sais happily, flipping to the page in the book. " _Bombarda._ It was in that third year spellbook that you gave us earlier. And we found an extinguishing spell in our charms book."

Remus studied the spell critically. "Looks good, lads." He said approvingly. "Did you show this to Pete?"

"Pete's nicking the paint from the potions lab." Said James, kicking his feet on top of the table, scattering the books that Remus had carefully stacked on the table. Remus pursed his lips slightly. "We can tell him when he comes back to the dorm."

"Alright." Remus said, restacking his books and standing up from the table. "And we have until Halloween to work out the details, so we can practice learning the spells in the mean time."

"Okay!" Sirius said brightly, pulling his bag over his shoulder and standing up. "Now let's get out of here." He added with an exaggerated shudder. "All these books... I have no clue how you find it relaxing."

HPHPHPHP

 _"Bombarda!"_

The pillow that Sirius was attempting to explode ripped slightly at the seam, a fee of the soft downy feathers poking out of thr small tear. "Damn it!"

Remus patted Sirius on the shoulder. "Don't worry, Sirius." He said reassuringly. "You have plenty of time to learn the spell before Halloween."

"Sirius doesn't have enough patience to learn a third year spell." James piped up cheerfully. He was laying down on his bed, watching Sirius struggle to perform the spell. "Anything that's not instant gratification for him, he gives up."

"I don't understand what I'm doing _wrong,_ though!" Sirius said angrily, pointedly ignoring James' remark. "I'm doing what you said!"

"It's your wand movement." Remus said patiently. "It's more of a - " he indicated the complicated-looking wand movement, Sirius trying desperatly to follow. When he saw it was clear that Sirius was completly lost, he said, "Here, let me show you." He pointed his wand at the cusion and cleared his throat. _"Bombarda!"_

The pillow exploded, showering them all with white feathers.

Siriud brushed the feathers out of his hair and sat grumpily on the foot of James' bed, folding his arms. "I can't do it. I'm not gonna learn it in time."

"Sirius, come on mate." James said, sitting up and moving to sit next to Sirius. "You've only been at it for a few hours, and we've got almost a month before the prank."

The door to the dormotories was suddenly thrown open, and Peter stumbled in, struggling to carry a large tub of dark red paint.

"Pete!" James said quickly, hurriedly standing up and grabbing the other side of the heavy tub, helping Peter lower the tub to the ground. "Good job, mate! You got the paint!"

"Well observed." Peter said grumpily, wiping a bead of sweat from his forehead. "And it wasn't easy, either. I was about halfway to the dorms when I ran in to Peeves!"

They all groaned sympathetically. Since they arrived at Hogwarts, all of them had had at least one encounter with the infamous poltergeist, Peeves. He seemed to make it his mission to make all of the students as miserable as he possibly could. "What did he do?" Sirius asked.

"Started throwing chalk at me." Peter said, collapsing onto his bed. "I nearly got caught with all the noise that he was making. How are the spells going?"

"Not good." Sirius sighed, flicking a stray feather off of the scarlet gryffindor duvet. "Remus is the only one who can do all three spells."

"But you three don't have to learn the writing spell." Remus added. "Only I have to do that one, since I have the best handwriting. And we don't have to know the spells properly until Halloween."

"Even so." Sirius muttered.

"Merlin, you're so _annoying,_ Sirius!" James said good-naturedly, slapping him on the back. "Let's just _stop sulking_ and get to dinner, alright."

Sirius perked up a little bit. "Alright. Dinner." Sirius said, stowing his wand safely in his pocket before standing up and exiting the dorm, followed by the other three marauders.

"Is food _all_ you three ever think about?" Remus asked exasperatedly as they all clambered out of the portrait hole.

"Yes." James, Sirius, and Peter said similtaniously.

"That, and pranks." Sirius added.

"And messing with Snivellus." James said.

Remus bit his lip and said nothing. He hated how James and Sirius were constantly harrasing Snape. He admitted that he did not like the boy in the least, but he knew that Snape and Lily were sort of... friends? And it really seemed to upset Lily when people would constantly pick on Snape. But James and Sirius were his _friends,_ real friends that didn't scowl at the sight of him, didn't flinch when they heard his name. He didn't want to screw it up by making them upset with him. Remus had no idea why these three idiots even came to like him, but now that they did, the thought of ever giving them up was practically unfathomable.

"Remus." Sirius said quietly, jarring him out of his thoughts. James and Peter had already walked ahead and were chatting animatedly, so they did not notice Sirius lagging behind slightly. Sirius was studying Remus's face intensely. "You've got that look on your face again."

Damn. Could Sirius tell that he was upset? Was he really that easy to read? "What look?"

"That look you get where your lips get all pouty and your eyebrows furrow and you look down at the floor." Sirius said, reaching out to gently touch his arm. "What's wrong?"

Remus looked at Sirius' with a mixture of happiness and confliction. Sirius really _really_ cared about him. Even if he was totally oblivious. So did he tell Sirius, tell him that he had a problem with them messing with Snape? They would probably scoff at him, ask him if he was going soft for caring about 'old Snivelly'.

Remus looked back up at Sirius, his amber eyes meeting Sirius' stormy grey ones. There was something intense in Sirius' gaze, an emotion that Remus couldn't quite place.

Then Remus lookes back at the floor, and the moment was broken. "I'm fine, Sirius."

HPHPHPHPHP

 **Okay, chapter is done! These last few chapters have been mainly Remus POV (cause Remus is awesome), but the next chapter will probably have some Sirius in it (because Sirius is also** **awesome lol)**

 **Anyway, before I end this chapter, I want to talk about something, or rather, someone: James Potter.**

 **I have been extremly bored this month because I haven't been in school, so I've been trolling the internet a lot. And I came across some very intense debates about whether James Potter was a good person or not. And man, do people have strong opinions about this subject!**

 **Here's my view on it: We hardly know anything about James Potter; all we have is a memory from a pensive and some descriptions from his friends. So yes, James was an asshole in the memory that WE** **saw, but that was _one_ memory. Imagine if all we had to judge Harry on was a memory of him using sectumsempra on Draco in his 6th year? We'd probably say he was a dark wizard with evil powers. But the momemts we don't see from James' life: James befriending the lonely looking boy with the scars and the chubby outcast, and treating them with kindness. Not betraying Remus when they find out he's a werewolf, becoming illegal animagi at age fifteen _just_ to help out said werewolf friend. These are the moments of kindness that we don't get to see from James.**

 **So yes, James was an idiot in his fifth year. But think of Lily Evans. Lily is described as a smart, sensible girl who makes good desicions and can take care of herself. Do you really think she would willingly go out with James Potter if he wasn't genuinely a good guy? No, she wouldn't.**

 **So, that's my opinion on the whole 'James Potter debate.' If you're still here, thanks for listening to me ramble. I'll hopefully update soon. Bye!!**


	8. Chapter eight- the Giggling Pear

**If you're any type of Harry Potter fan, you'll know from the name of the chapter what's coming next ...;)**

 **Anyway, a question for everyone: What's your favorite HP ship? (Canon or non-canon, cause I have both** **) My favorite non-canon ships are WolfStar (obviously) and Scorbus, and my fave canon ones are TeddyVictorie and Jily (I have never really liked Snily, but to each their own) I have LOTS of others that I like, but these are my favorite ones.**

 **Anyway, enjoy the chapter!**

HPHPHPHP

Sirius really couldn't explain why he was so protective of Remus.

He didn't think that Remus wasn't capable of taking care of himself. Remus probably knew more spells than the other three marauders combined, and was quite capable of protecting himself.

So he really couldn't explain exactly _why_ he had hexed those two Ravenclaws when Professer McGonagall had demanded he explain.

It started a few days after they started planning their Halloween prank. They had just finished potions, where Remus had spectacularly exploded yet another potion, this time a coughing solution. For some odd reason, Remus seemed to excel in all of his classes, _exept_ potions. He even seemed to dislike _being_ in the potions room. He would always wince and wrinkle up his nose whenever he entered the crowded dungeon, and he would hurriedly exit as soon as classes were over.

But anyway, that wasn't the point. So, Remus had left a bit earlier than the others, so they were heading to the great hall to look for him. They were about to turn the corner when they heard someone speak.

"What's wrong with your face?" The voice said, a mocking note in his tone. "It looks like you ran face-first into an angry hippogriph."

Sirius stopped and threw an arm in front of James and Peter, silencing them with a finger. What was going on?

The boys slowly peered around the corner. They could see the faces of two fourth year Ravenclaw boys, both of their wands pointed at a brown-haired boy who's back was to them. The boy seemed to hunch into himself as the Ravenclaws sneered at him.

"I-I... I d-don't..."

"Can you even talk, Lupin?"

"I bet he can't. It's cause he's Loopy. Loony, Loopy, Lupin with the freaky scars and pity friends."

Sirius didn't exactly remember what had happened after that. He heard the person speak, then he saw red. The next thing he knew, both he and James were standing with their wands outstretched, pointing at the pair of Ravenclaws who were writhing on the floor with strange tentacles sprouting over their body. Must have been the combination of whatever hexes he and James had used.

And behind the two Ravenclaws was Remus, who still had his head down, as if he was trying to make himself as small as possible. Sirius saw Remus raise up a trembling fist to his face and wipe his eyes.

Without thinking, Sirius took three bounding steps towards Remus and threw his arms around him in a fierce hug. He felt Remus tense in his arms, but Sirius just wrapped them around him tighter. Remus eventually reached up to tentativly hug Sirius in return.

"Are you alright, Remus?" Sirius asked, pulling back from the hug to study Remus critically. Remus' amber eyes were wide with shock.

"They are such gits!" James said furiously, giving the squirming Ravenclaws a kick before going over to Remus. "We're sorry about that, mate. I didn't know Ravenclaws could be so Slytherin-y."

Remus didn't responde. He just flushed and looked down at the ground. His hand went self-consiously to touch the scar across his left eye.

"Hey." Sirius reprememded softly, taking Remus' hand away from his face. "We don't care about your scars, mate. Really, we barely even notice them." Lie. Sirius didn't tell the other boys this, but he often would lay awake for hours at night, his brain cycling through all of the possible reasons for Remus' mysterious behavior and strange scars. But of course he would never tell Remus that.

"And what those guys said, it isn't true." James added, putting his hand on Remus' shoulder and smiling. "We aren't your pity friends. We're friends with you because you're kind, and funny, and smart, and a good friend."

Remus flushed dark red and looked back at Sirius, a small smile on his face. "Thank you." He said softly.

"Uh, lads!" Peter said warningly, pointing behind them. "McGonagall!"

"What? What do you - "

"What on Earth is going on here?" Professer McGonagall said as she rounded the corner, taking in the scene of the Ravenclaws on the floor, who were coming back to consiousness and still covered in tentacles, to Sirius and James who were both still holding their wands.

One of the Ravenclaws swore loudly and stood up. "Those buggers hexed us for no reason!" He said furiously, his companion also standing up and nodding vigourously.

"Black! Potter!" She said furiously, rounding on the two stunned black-haired boys. "Is this true?"

"No!" James said, looking completly outraged.

McGonagall raised her eyebrows. "Really? So you _didn't_ hex them."

"No, we _did,_ " Sirius said quickly, desperate to explain himself, "but they were - "

"You two!" She interrupted loudly, pointing at the Ravenclaw boys, "Go to the hospital wing and have Madam Pomfrey sort you out. Black, Potter, come with me."

Sirius and James gulped and glanced at eachother.

"Please, professer - " Remus said quietly.

"Not now, Lupin." She said, beckoning Sirius and James after her. "I need to talk to your friends now."

Remus shot them a desperatly apologetic look and mouthed _I'm sorry_ to them as they were rushed out of sight.

Professer McGonagal motioned them into her burgandy colored office and sat at her desk. "Sit." She ordered. Sirius and James nervously obeyed, glancing at eachother.

"Now," McGonagal said through pursed lips, "Would you two care to explain to me _why_ you two hexed those Ravenclaws? Surely you know that you're not allowed to use magic in the halls."

"Please, professer," James said, and Sirius knew how upset James was to use a word like 'please' to a teacher, "They were making fun of Remus - "

"Made fun of those scars he had on his face, you know - "

"And they called him 'loony, loopy Lupin' - "

"And we just got really upset, cause he's our mate, you know - "

"And we just kind of... hexed him." James finished somewhat lamely, looking back down at his lap, scratching the back of his head.

McGonagall was looking at them with a very odd expression on her face. She then spoke uncertianly, "So both of you took on two boys who were twice your size just because they were saying a few unkind words to Mister Lupin?"

"Well, yeah, of course we did." James said as though it was the most obvious answer in the world. "Remus was really upset, and he's really self-consious of his scars, so we have to stand up for him."

The odd expression remained on McGonagall's face. After a moment, she cleared her throat and quickly rearranged her features into a stern expression. "While I admire your actions of standing up for your friends, you must understand that dueling in the hallways is strictly forbidden, and I'm afraid I'll have to give you both detention tonight." Sirius and James both groaned. "Tonight at eight oclock, in the potions room with professer Slughorn. You are dismissed."

HPHPHPHP

"I'm so, so, so sorry, lads." Remus repeated for what felt like the thousandth time as James and Sirius got ready to go to detention after they had all eaten dinner. "You really shouldn't have done that for me, I'm not worth - "

"Remus." Sirius interrupted, half amused and half exasperated. "For the last time, _we're not upset._ We wanted to stand up for you, and we'll do it again if we have to, even if it means getting detention every day."

"Sirius, you really shouldn't - "

"Remus, you've known us for over a month now, you should know that we cam be very stubborn if we want to be." James said cheerfully, putting his books in his bag and tossing it on his bed. "And besides, it was about time we had our first detention. I mean, seriously. It took us a whole month to get in trouble? I'm dissapointed in us."

"Indeed." Sirius said, walking up to James and throwing his arm around his shoulder, mussing his hair with his knuckles. "So, don't feel sorry, Rem. You should feel proud that you aided the marauders in their quest to manage as much mischief as possible."

Remus smiled in spite of himself. "Go, you big idiots." He said, giving them a light shove out of the door. "If you're late, you'll get another detention."

"See you in a few hours, Remus!" James called loudly as they clambered down the spiral staircase and out of the door. "Wait for us!"

Sirius was strangely silent as they made their way to the dungeon for their detention. James glanced over worriedly at Sirius to see that he had his dark eyebrows furrowed and he was frowning at the floor.

"What's wrong, mate?" James asked concernedly as they entered the dungeon and sat at a desk, waiting for professer Slughorn. "You've been really quiet all evening."

Sirius looked up to James "...Where do you reckon Remus' scars came from?" He asked curiously, making James blink in surprise.

"That's what you've been worried about?"

When Sirius nodded, James looked at the floor. "I... I've thought about it a lot too." He admitted, scratching the back of his neck. "I just figured that maybe he has a dog at home or something, and he got into a fight with it before he came to Hogwarts."

"Yeah, but the scars look too _old_ for that." Sirius argued. "They look as if they've been there for a long time. And besides, what dog could make scars that big, and on his face?"

"I don't know, Sirius. But what else could it be?" James asked. "I'm sure it's not really anything to worry about."

"I think it _is_ something to worry about, though!" Sirius said stubbornly. He then glanced around the room, as if to make sure that no one was listening. "Remember when he went to visit his mum last month?"

James noddes slowly.

"Well, when he came back, he lifted his collar a little bit, I saw a great big slash on his neck. A fresh one." Sirius said quietly.

"I - that's probably just a coincidence, Sirius..." James said, looking less sure of himself than he did before.

"Yeah, but - "

"Oh, goody!" Slughorn said loudly, entering the dungeon suddenly. "You boys are already here, I see. Welcome to detention."

Jame sand Sirius exchanges slightly raised eyebrows. "What are we to do, sir?" Sirius asked, in what he felt like was a cretibal imitation of politeness.

"As your punishment, you are going to be cleaning all of the cauldrons by hand." He said cheerfully, clapping his hands together. Sirius bit back a groan of complaint. "Oh, and make sure you wear your protective gloves, because the ingrediants that the fifth years were using last could put holes in your hands."

"Wow, I feel safer already." James muttered into Sirius' ear.

"And you aren't to leave until every cauldron is clean." Slughorn said, seeming to have not heard James. "I will not be able to moniter you today, but rest assured if you don't complete your task, you will be punished accordingly." He waved his wand menacingly, as if to prove his point. He then turned around and exited the room.

"'If you don't complete your task, you will be punished accordingly.'" James said in a scarily accurate impression of Professer Slughorn's pompous manor. "What a load of bollocks. Lazy bugger can't even stay in the room."

"Yeah, Slughorn's a prat." Sirius agreed, grabbing a pair of protective gloves and pulling them over his hands. "Did you know that he favors my cousin?"

"The mental one?" Sirius nodded and James raised his eyebrows. "Really?"

"I know!" Sirius said tremulously, grabbing a sponge and a bottle of magical cleaner. "She's in Slughorn's stupid Slug club."

 _"Slug club?"_ James snorted. "That sounds fairly unnapealing."

"He favors everyone in my family." Sirius said moodily as he scrubbed a cauldron that was caked with a congealed red substance that looked disturbingly like blood. "I expect soon enough he'll try to indoctrinate me into his stupid group so I can 'uphold the family honor' or something similarly nauseating."

Scrubbing the cauldrons was long and tedious work. At one point. James accidentally spilled a blob of some purple substance on his arm and let and let out a loud yelp as it started to burn the hairs on his arm. Luckily Sirius was able to help him quickly scrub it of before it managed to damage his arm, but there was a large pink patch near his wrist that was completly hairless and stood out in stark contrast to his tan skin.

"We shouldn't have to do this anymore." Sirius complained as he scraped a large black glop of something off of his fourty-seventh cauldron. "It's nearly nine and we'll be in trouble if Slughorn doesn't show up to take us back to our dorms." Sirius sighed and collapsed in a seat near the wall, staring at the nearly-full moon in the sky.

"Well, let's just _go_ then." James said, tossing his sponge onto a table and wiping his face with his sleeve. "We'll just tell Slughorn that it was too late to keep going, and hopefully we won't get caught."

"Alright, fine." Sirius said, tugging off his gloves. "Let's go."

The halls were dark when they finally exited the dungeon and slowly started climbing up to the Gryffindor common room. They were about halfway there when suddely a large water balloon narrowly missed Sirius, soaking his shoes and socks in icy water.

"Ah! Son of a - "

"Ooooh, students out of beeeeed!" Said a cackling voice.

James and Sirius both groaned. Peeves. "Peeves, please be quiet, we're just trying to get back to our dorm."

"Ooh, ikle firsties!" Peeves said loudly, turning upside down and grinning wickidly at them. "Are Black and Potty being naughty?"

"Peeves! Shut up!" Sirius whisper-shouted.

"STUDENTS OUT OF BEEEED!" Peeves hollared loudly, tossing the rest of his water balloons in the air before zooming off. "STUDENTS IN THE CORRIDOR!!!"

"Run!" Sirius said quickly.

They ran as fast as they could, tripping over eachothers feet as they bolted down the corridor. The had no clue where they were going, only that they were trying to get as far away from Peeves and Filch as possible.

After running for about fifteen minutes, they started to slow down until they collapsed against a large painting of a bowl of fruit in an empty corridor.

"Jesus, that was close." James said shakily, running a hand through his hair, making it look more ridiculous than usual.

"Yeah." Sirius agreed, sliding down the wall slightly. "We definatly need to be more ca - "

Sirius and James suddenly lept back as if they had been burned. They heard a loud, high-pitched giggle come from the painting that they had just been leaning on.

"What was that?" Sirius said nervously, examining the painting. It seemed to be a normal bowl of fruit.

Sirius slowly reached out a finger and scratched it down the painting. When he reached the large, painted pear, the painting let out another chuckle, and suddenly the pear turned into -

"Is that... a door handle?" James asked curiously, eyeing the spot where the pear used to be on the painting.

"... Yeah." Sirius said, equally bemused. "Should we open it?"

"If you want to."

Sirius reached out uncertianly and pulled on the large green handle. And, just like that, the painting swung foward like a door and they were quickly ushered inside a large, bright room.

A small house elf in a crisp white pillowcase ran up to them and quickly bowed, its long nose brushing the floor.

"Hello, sirs!" The elf sqeaked, much to James' bemusment. "How can I helps you, sirs?"

"Um..." James said, looking fairly bewildered, "I-it's James, James Potter. Where exactly are we?"

"The kitchen, sir Potter!" The elf said enthusiastically. "Would yous like me to gets something for yous to eat, sir?"

"J-just James is fine." James said uncomfortably, tapping his fingers against his thigh. "And... did you say we're in the kitchen? And we can get food here?"

The house elf beamed. "Yes, sir James!" James frowned, but didn't correct the elf. "This is where all of the foods at Hogwarts is made! Would yous like anything to take with yous?"

James shook his head. "No thank you, we - "

Sirius kicked James in the shin. "Yes, please!" He said loudly, ignoring James' glare. "Can you get four hot cocoas and some chocolate muffins?"

"Yes, sir!" The elf squeaked with a another small bow before rushing off to gather the food.

"Sirius!" James whisper-shouted, staring at the many house-elves apprehensivly. "Why were they acting like that? Like... like calling us 'sir' and stuff?"

Sirius looked ad James in surprise. "You don't have a house elf at home?" He asked.

"I _do,_ but our house elf doesn't act like that!" James said.

"Well, most house elves do." Sirius said, nodding at the house elves as they shoved a tray of hot cocoas and several chocolate muffins into his arm. "Your family might be nice to elves, but most familys aren't house elves are just slaves in most families. And you shoudn't ask house elves to call you by your first name, they won't know how to react. They might get offended."

When James still looked uncertian, Sirius clapped him on the shoulder. "I wouldn't worry about it, mate. It's honestly not that big of a deal." They quietly slipped out of the kitchen and started walking back to the Gryffindor common room.

"...Okay." James said slowly.

They arrived at the portrait hole and whispered the password, climbing into the common room.

Remus and Peter were the only ones downstairs. Peter was curled up in front of the fire like a cat, half asleep. Remus was sitting in a large chair beside Peter, his nose buried in _Transfiguration today._ There were dark circles under his eyes when he quickly snapped up to look at Sirius and James.

"Oh good, you're back." Remus said in relief, standing up and rushing over to them. His pale skin was thrown into sharp relief as he stepped into the light. "I was getting worried. What's that?" He asked, eyeing the mugs in Sirius' arms.

Sirius grabbed a mug and put in Remus' hands, noting as he did so that Remus' small fingers were freezing cold. "Hot chocolate." He said when Remus looked at hin questioningly.

Remus' face lit up. "Thanks!" He said gratefully, bringing the mug to his lips and taking a long drink. He shuddered slightly. "I love chocolate. Where'd you get it?"

"Okay, so you won't believe this." Sirius said, grabbing his own mug and taking a sip. "So, we were running away from Peeves after we left the potions room, right? We turned down this corridor with a big painting of a bowl of fruit. Turns out, it's a passage to the kitchen!"

"The kitchen?" Remus said with a smile, raising his eyebrows. "So that's where you got the muffins, huh?"

"Yep." James said, picking a chocolate chip out of one of the muffin and popping it into his mouth. "There were house elves everywhere."

"It was bloody amazing." Sirius added.

Remus gave them another small smile before quickly ducking his head again and grabbing his book, burying his head in it.

"Hey!" Sirius said, snatching the book from Remus' grasp. "No studying! You've been working constantly ever since we got here, you look exhausted. You need to take a break."

"I _have_ to study." Remus protested, making a half-hearted swipe for the book. "A-anyway, I need you three to take notes for me again tomorrow. I-I'm going home again. To see my m-mother."

Sirius frowned, tilting his head to the side to examine Remus' face more critically. He looked ill again, just like he did last month. "Is she okay?" He asked worriedly.

Remus gave a tired smile. "Yeah, she'll be fine. She just likes to have me home. To look after her, you know." Remus' hand went up absently to touch the scar on his face.

Sirius' frown deepened at these odd behaviors. What was going on? "...Okay, Rem." He said, patting Remus on the shoulder before heading to the dormotories. "Goodnight."

"Goodnight, Sirius."

HPHPHPHPHPHP

 **I really liked this chapter! I really enjoy writing from Sirius' perspective, so expect more chapters about Sirius. There will still be plenty of Remus, of course. (I just love Remus... and Sirius... I just love them both so much! Eh... am I crazy?)**

 **So, Sirius is starting to question Remus' odd behaviors. Expect lots of Remus-watching and lots of jumping-to-conclusions from him and James. Peter wasn't in this chapter much, so I'll try to include him more in the next chapter.**

 **My summer break ends this Tuesday, so updates may be a bit more spread apart. But I'll try to have them every sunday!**

 **That's all for now. Bye!**


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